


i won't say (i'm in love)

by reymanova



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Aromantic Stevie Budd, Excessive use of italics, Gen, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Underage Drinking, Underage Drug Use, gian; blood; snow; and the general concept of waviness, local aro ace sneaks aro stevie into every david/patrick fic she writes, the list of things that accidentally got out of hand in this fic includes:
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:08:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 39,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25980343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reymanova/pseuds/reymanova
Summary: In which the Roses lose their fortune when David and Alexis are still in high school, and David is forced to spend his senior year at Schitt’s Creek High School. One Patrick Brewer is a Schitt’s Creek native and also an SCHS senior.You know where this is going.
Relationships: Alexis Rose & David Rose, Patrick Brewer & Rachel, Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Stevie Budd & David Rose, Theodore "Ted" Mullens/Alexis Rose
Comments: 156
Kudos: 167





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic because I Won’t Say (I’m In Love) from Hercules came on shuffle and Stina enabled me. I have no other explanation. 
> 
> Sincerest thanks to Stina ([grapehyasynth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/grapehyasynth/pseuds/grapehyasynth)) for being Beta of the Year, for her mastery of the word “whom”, and for pointing out all the accidental innuendos my aro ace ass unwittingly wrote into this. 
> 
> _Some notes:_  
>  \- In an unprecedented move, this fic is already about 99% done, so I'll be posting a chapter a day.  
> \- Although everyone’s ages are bumped down and messed with considerably in this fic, it’s set in modern day because I’m too lazy to make things time-accurate.  
> \- I maintain that the show itself takes place in Ontario, but this takes place in the states because that was my high school experience, and that whole culture ended up playing into it more than I expected. Just throw Schitt’s Creek into bumfuck Michigan or Indiana or something, and bingo, welcome to this AU.
> 
> Alright, now let's party.

David was not going to that fucking school. Not in this hick town where everyone marries their lice-ridden cousins and eats venison they killed in their backyard at Thanksgiving and wears Wranglers that they bought at Cabela’s, and frankly it was a sin that David had even so much as _learned_ words like “venison” and “Wranglers” and “Cabela’s” in the two weeks since moving to this godforsaken place. And all of this was why, at 11pm the night before his first day of senior year, he was laying face-down on his tiny-ass twin bed in the motel room that he shared with his moisturizer-stealing sister in perhaps the worst town on the face of the Earth, and his father was trying to parent him for the first time in 17 years. 

David’s speech was muffled as he asked, “If I suffocate myself with this pillow and die an untimely death, you won’t force my limp, soulless body to go to school anyway, will you?”

“Aw, it’s so cute to pretend you have a soul, David,” Alexis said. Without picking up his head, David flipped the bird somewhere in the general direction of her voice. 

“Son, I know you’re nervous, everyone wants to make a good impression on their first day, but—” 

“I’m not _nervous_ .” David sat up indignantly and stared his father down. “And I know I’ll make a good first impression. I mean, look at me. I’m just _pissed_ that you are forcing me to attend an institution where people drive tractors to school. Honestly, I should just drop out.”

Johnny stared David down. “You will not be dropping out. And David, this… life change has been hard on all of us. Your mother only started going outside on Saturday—”

“Yeah, and I was like, supposed to be the Queen to Stavros’s Homecoming King this year,” Alexis interjected, filing aggressively at her nails.

“You can’t be Homecoming Queen as a junior,” David said. 

“Yeah, well, obviously I know that, I’m the one who’s actually _been_ on Homecoming Court every year. But they were gonna make an exception for the, and I quote, ‘most powerful power couple the school had seen in its century-long history.’”

“My point _is_ , kids,” Johnny said, raising his voice a little, “This hasn’t been easy. But I’m gaining ground with Roland about selling this town, and as soon as we do that, we can get the hell out of dodge. Until then, we just have to keep our heads down.”

“Okay but like, Georgina says that a refined woman should always keep her chin up,” Alexis said. 

David smirked. “Good thing you’re not a refined woman, then.”

“Ugh, David. At least I’m likable. I’ll be drowning in invites to… to cute little flannel-ridden tailgate parties and a cappella contests in empty swimming pools, and you’ll just be over here brooding in the corner, as usual.”

“Okay, why would I walk into a pig sty and try to make friends with the pigs?”

“Does your little friend at the front desk know you think she’s a pig?”

“Stevie is _not_ my friend, she is an acquaintance who sometimes gets me weed.”

Johnny’s eyes widened. “Stevie is getting you weed?”

David shot him a deadpan look. “Yeah, we also spend the weekends shooting up heroin with needles that we found out back by the dumpster. It’s a really popular pastime in this town.”

A voice floated in from the room next door. “If you’re going to partake in heroin, darling, at least sterilize the needle first. I’m sure there are sanitization materials somewhere to be found in this podunk little hamlet.”

“Oh my god, Mom, I’m not doing heroin! Fine, I’ll go to school, now will you leave me alone?”

* * *

David Rose was not _lost_ . David Rose didn’t get _lost_ , because David Rose usually had Martin to chauffeur him around, and David Rose usually didn’t find himself in high schools that looked like regular old squares on the outside but on the inside were shaped like they were designed by a kindergartner with a crayon and a blindfold. 

But alas, here he was, in the depths of the prison that was Schitt’s Creek High School (Proud Home of the Schitt’s Creek Beavers!), and he couldn’t find his fucking science class. He was seriously considering just giving up and skipping it when he turned the corner and bodily ran into someone who looked like the living incarnation of a pair of khakis. 

Even in the course of the morning David had already seen him around, he realized, surrounded by a group of kids in varsity jackets who probably thought Axe body spray was top shelf, and carrying around AP textbooks and that same kind of giant calculator that Gian used to bring to his tutoring sessions, the one that got broken the last time they hooked up. Or was it the second to last time? David couldn’t remember. Either way, he was coming to realize that he was staring at this person and his Kohl’s henley that was surely bought on sale. 

“David Rose, right?” The kid asked with way too much genuine interest.

“Yeah,” David replied blandly. 

“I’m Patrick. Patrick Brewer. You lost?”

“I’m not _lost_ ,” David shot back, because he wasn’t. He simply wasn’t. 

Patrick glanced around at the otherwise empty hallway, a glint in his eyes that David most certainly did not like. “Oh, so just taking a nice stroll instead of going to third hour, then? On your first day?”

“Maybe. And what are you doing?”

He held up a manila envelope. “Mrs. Schitt needed me to run this down to the office for student council.”

“Oh, you _would_ be on student council. What are you, secretary? VP?”

“Treasurer. Although I’m offended that you didn’t peg me for the president type.”

“Mm, no. Too diminutive.”

Patrick raised his eyebrows, but his eyes didn’t lose that stupid glint. “Diminutive, really? Well, luckily I think my ego can take it. Now, whose classroom did you not get lost on the way to?”

David sighed and pulled out his schedule. “Mr. Cividino’s room?”

“Oh, that one’s in a weird corner. Here, I’ll show you.” Patrick handed the schedule back and walked off without a second glance. David reluctantly followed, and they walked in silence for a few moments. 

“Why are you helping me?”

Patrick turned to look at David with an expression he couldn’t quite place. “What? Why would I not?”

“Because you seem…” David gestured vaguely at Patrick’s whole demeanor, all varsity jacket and honor roll and student council suck-up. “Well-liked. Why would you want to be seen with me? It’s not like I have the money anymore, I can’t buy you E. Trust me, if I could, I’d keep it all for myself.”

For some reason, Patrick smiled at this. He wasn’t supposed to smile at that. “Uh, no, I don’t want any E. I’m just… being nice.”

“Is this like a Jesus thing? Like you think if you don’t help me, Satan will eat your soul for breakfast?”

“Not a Jesus thing. I just know that it sucks being the new kid. And I like to think that I’m a nice person.”

“Well, that’s unsettling,” David said, and Patrick laughed. Why the fuck was he laughing? And how did it feel like he was laughing with David rather than at him when David was literally not laughing at all? 

“Okay, David.” Patrick stopped and gestured at the door in front of them. “Room B113.”

David peered in through the window, assessing. “Mm.”

“Y’know, this is usually the part where you would say ‘thank you, Patrick,’ and I would say ‘you’re welcome, David, see you around.’”

“Interesting.” David turned back to Patrick and just stared, very clearly not going to thank him. And once again, the fucker had the audacity to _laugh_. 

Patrick just laughed and shook his head and walked away, but before he got too far, he said over his shoulder, “You’re welcome, David, see you around.”

David watched him until he turned the corner and then, with a furrow in his brow that if pressed, he would claim was because he had such a distaste for science, walked into the classroom. 

* * *

Sometime that evening, David wandered outside the motel to track down a snack and smelled something distinctly... weed-y. He followed the smell around the building and found one Stevie Budd sitting at a picnic table with joint in hand.

“Aren’t you supposed to be working?” he asked. 

“Just got out. I don’t work as many hours during the school year.”

“Why?”

“My aunt seems to think I need the extra time to do homework. Which I don’t actually do about half the time, but.”

“Mm.” David looked distastefully at the old, flaking picnic table before deciding that it was a better option than the ground, and sat down. “Can I have a hit?”

Stevie slowly blew out a puff of smoke, considering this. “What do I get in return?”

“I have literally nothing to give you and you know it.”

“I like your sweater,” Stevie said. 

“I’m not giving you my fucking sweater. This was a thousand dollars.”

“I’m not asking you to give it to me. Maybe just let me wear some of your clothes sometimes. Starting with that leather jacket you’ve got.”

“It would absolutely not fit you,” David said. 

“So is it a deal or no?”

“You wear my last remaining vestiges of wealth whenever you want, probably disrespecting them and getting holes and Flaming Hot Cheetos on them, and in return I get one hit of your shitty joint? No way.”

“Fine. I wear something of yours once a week and am _very_ respectful to your wealth or your vestiges or whatever, and in return you get indefinite hits of my shitty joints.” She dangled the blunt off her fingers, swaying her hand side to side as if trying to hypnotize him. 

“Ugh, fine,” David said, snatching it out of her hands and taking a long drag. 

They sat there in comfortable silence for a few minutes, just passing the blunt back and forth. “You know,” David said, looking up absently at the darkening sky, “if you’re wearing my clothes people might think we’re dating.”

Stevie let out a noise somewhere between a huff and a laugh, eyeing David, who kept his own eyes very intentionally on the sky. “Yeah. But who the fuck cares?”

“I don’t know. Not sure if you wanted people thinking you were fucking the most fucked teenager in the eastern time zone.”

“Those _people_ are all washed up losers who are never gonna leave this town. I don’t give a shit if they think we’re fucking.”

“Alright.” Then David reached for the joint. “Stop hogging.”

“Um, it’s my weed.”

“And we have a deal.” 

Stevie rolled her eyes and handed it to him. “Can we come back to this most fucked teenager in the eastern time zone thing? Do you mean that literally, or figuratively, or…?”

David laughed hollowly. “Oh, I mean it in every possible way.”

“So given that we’re apparently fucking, I could get chlamydia?”

“Oh, yeah,” David said, finally moving to look her in the eyes. “Condoms are for plebs, so I’ve got every imaginable STI. I plan on spreading them to the entire school to exact my revenge on this town.”

“Good thinking,” Stevie said. “Just get your dick in everything.”

“My life motto.”

Suddenly, they were blinded by a set of headlights pulling into the motel parking lot. The rickety pickup pulled up right in front of the Roses’ rooms, and lo and behold — who climbed out but Alexis Rose, giggling over a smoothie with her designer backpack hanging off her arm. 

“Who the hell is she with?”

“Oh, that’s the Schitts’ truck.”

“Like, Mayor Schitt? English teacher Schitt? Why is she with them?”

Stevie squinted at the car. “Looks like it’s Mutt.”

“Mutt?”

“Yeah, Mutt Schitt. He was supposed to graduate last year, but he skipped too much, so I guess he’s our year now.” They watched as Alexis gave a flirty wave and stepped away from the car; with a wave of his own, Mutt drove away. 

“Already over Stavros, are we?” David called out to her. She whipped around, not having noticed him before, and gave him a smile and a middle finger before letting herself into their room. David turned to Stevie. “Seriously, though, do you think Mutt might give her chlamydia?”

Stevie handed him the joint. “I’d call it 50/50. Now, if you fucked Mutt, would the chlamydia just cancel out?”

David shot her a disbelieving look. “You cannot seriously believe that’s how it works.”

She just shrugged. “How am I supposed to know? I never do my science homework.” David just laughed and handed the joint back, leaning back against the table and staring at the sky. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- I haven’t taken a math class since 2015 when I got a one (the worst score possible, for those keeping track at home) on my AP Calc AB test, so any math references in this are courtesy my cursory and frankly triggering Google searches. I am not to be held accountable for them.  
> \- I would like to additionally note that I did almost zero (0) research on what AP Studio Art actually entails, so don’t roast me on the lack of realism. I know what I’ve done.  
> \- Furthermore, I don’t think there’s an actual calculator emoji, but let’s all pretend.

“These fries are so soggy,” David said, plucking a wilting cafeteria fry off of Stevie’s tray. “Like, I’m not even sure this counts as food. This is a… a fraudulent abomination in the skin suit of the humble potato.”

“Stop talking like your mom, it freaks me out,” Stevie said, slapping David’s hand away as he went in for another. “Also, if they’re so bad, why do you keep stealing mine?”

“I’m still hungry, and this town has clearly lowered my standards.”

“Soon you’ll be wearing rubber waders to school like the rest of us.”

David glared at her. “I don’t know what that means, and I don’t think I want to.”

Stevie gestured at the high-end black leather jacket she was wearing — very obviously David’s. He was right, it was much too big on her, but somehow she made the drowning-in-leather look work. “You know, I think a nice set of yellow waders would look real nice with this jacket. If anyone could pull it off, it’d be you.”

“Okay, thank you I guess? But also, I will absolutely not be doing that.”

With a grin, Stevie said, “Look out, New York Fashion Week — David Rose is here, sporting Schitt’s Creek chic.”

“Ugh, don’t even remind me of New York. I would sell my kidney to be back there right now.”

“Then by all means, be my guest. I’m sure we could find a local butcher who could chop you up.”

“I’d rather not bleed out in some butcher’s dirty basement, thanks.” With a huff, David dropped his head onto his arms on the table. “You know, a month ago, my parents were working out the details of flying me out on a private jet to do a bunch of college visits, and now I can’t even get out of this backwater shithole without selling my kidney on the black market to do it.”

Stevie shrugged. “Could still apply to those schools, and just try to get some financial aid.”

“Yeah, that won’t be happening.”

Stevie eyed him. “Why?”

“I…” David sighed. “My test scores are like, fine, or whatever. But I’ve never really tried that hard in school, so my grades aren’t exactly great? And my dad was just gonna buy me a spot at NYU or something, but now that’s not really an option.”

“Okay, Felicity Huffman.”

David glared at her. “Shut up.”

“Have you ever even taken an AP class?”

“Um, I’ll have you know that I’m in AP Studio Art at this very moment. Have  _ you  _ ever taken an AP class?”

“No, but I’m not the one trying to get into NYU without daddy’s money,” Stevie said with a smirk.

David shook his head, exasperated, but the side of his mouth twitched as he went in for another one of Stevie’s fries. “Did I or did I not tell you to shut up, you wench?”

* * *

Aside from his lunches with Stevie, David’s only real respite from the hellhole that was Schitt’s Creek High School was the hour that he spent in AP Studio Art each afternoon. He had managed to glare at enough of the other students when choosing seats on the first day that he occupied a table all by himself over in the back corner, as far away as possible from the other kids’ stench of mulch and cow poop and mulch made of cow poop. Ms. Segal generally let him be during free work time, too, so he got to spend his time sketching and doing his work and being left the fuck alone. 

By week two, David had settled into his routine in the class, so when he walked in on Wednesday afternoon and found Patrick Brewer sitting at his table, he was more than a little displeased. He approached his corner and dropped his things down with a bit more force than strictly necessary. “This is my table.”

Patrick looked up with a smile and that  _ stupid _ glint in his eye again. “Technically, I do think this table belongs to the school.”

“Okay but like, it’s  _ my _ table. What are you doing here?”

“Sitting.”

“You’re not even in this class.”

“I am now,” Patrick said. 

David gave him a disbelieving look, skeptical of why this kid — who could probably get into NYU on his own merit — would be in an art class when he could be in like… AP Chemical Math or something. So he asked him as such. 

“You have to know that ‘AP Chemical Math’ is not a thing, David,” Patrick said, very annoyingly not answering the very simple question David had posed. 

“I’m not known for my brains, I’m known for my dick and my money,” David shot back. Then he paused, considering. “Or I guess… just my dick now.”

David smirked as Patrick froze, his brain seemingly malfunctioning after hearing this particular comment. After a moment, he shook his head slightly and said, “Mrs. Schitt said that I had too many academics on my college apps and needed to diversify, so here I am.”

David raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “You had too many academics. So you remedied that by joining an… AP class.”

Patrick just shrugged. “Yeah. Well, that and Mrs. Lee recently took over yearbook, and she really does not like me for some reason? So I kind of wanted out of there.”

“Wow, that must be hard for you,” David said, putting on the best faux-genuine voice he could muster. Judging by Patrick’s expression, however, he had not succeeded in fooling him. “A single person refusing to act like the sun shines out your ass. Is she the first?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Patrick said with an amused grin, “but it looks like you’re coming in real quick as the second. Guess I’ve just really been hitting it out of the park lately.”

“I don’t know what that means,” David said, but left it at that, because he was frankly impressed at the bite behind Patrick’s comment.

Patrick just laughed and said, “Okay, David,” and they settled into a comfortable silence for the rest of class. It should’ve been weird — it should’ve. David  _ had _ just openly shat on perhaps the most well-liked person in the senior class, to his face. Usually, this is where his general lack of regard for the feeble and ultimately fruitless efforts of his poor brain filter and where his uncontrollable instinct to dig his heels in and wholly bulldoze an even deeper hole would really take hold. Usually, this is where people would decide that David was Too Much or Too Harsh or Too Aloof for them and would stop bothering to converse. But Patrick’s silence just didn’t feel like that. It wasn’t tense, it didn’t carry an air of put-on disinterest. Patrick just sat and did his work and David sat and did his, and it was just… fine. 

And if David spent far too much time contemplating this while lying in bed that night, well — it was just because he wasn’t used to people sitting comfortably and peacefully in silence with him. It had nothing to do with his interest in the person in question. Nothing at all. 

* * *

They got into a groove, David and Patrick. They would come to class and sit at their table, David would openly judge Patrick’s artistic undertakings (which Patrick himself openly admitted were not exactly top tier), Patrick would make fun of David for his reluctance to use color under any circumstances. Then class would end and David and Patrick would go onto their respective lives with their respective friends and that was that. 

So Patrick’s look of concern when David showed up to class ten minutes late one afternoon was simply because their ritual for the day had been disturbed, David convinced himself, because after all, Patrick was very schedule-oriented. They didn’t know each other well enough for Patrick to actually wonder or care where he was. And the fact that, once David threw his backpack down and sat with an exaggerated sigh, Patrick asked him where he had been, was simply him being  _ nice _ again, David was sure. 

“I was being actively murdered by pre-calculus, is where I was,” David said, not without a slight flair for the dramatics.

“Oof. Who do you have?”

“Gunnarsson.”

“At least she can teach. I had Foley for pre-calc last year, and I basically had to teach myself.”

“Yeah well, Gunnarsson just spent ten minutes after class trying to explain functions to me and I’m still too stupid to get it, so a lot of good her teaching abilities are doing me.”

Patrick gave him a disbelieving look. “I highly doubt you’re  _ too stupid _ to get it, David.”

David pulled out the project he was working on and started setting it up. “What, you just think I’m not working hard enough then?” David was probably being too mean, he realized belatedly (feeling guilt over being too mean? What was this town doing to him?), but Patrick was the nearest punching bag, and, well, David was fucking _ bombing  _ pre-calc. 

“That is definitely not what I said. Sometimes it just takes time to get your head wrapped around it.”

“For  _ you,  _ maybe.”

Patrick eyed David, who was now very aggressively sharpening his charcoal pencils and lining them up in militantly neat rows. “Do you want me to help you?”

Eyes still on his pencils, David scoffed, “Yeah, okay.” When Patrick didn’t answer, he stopped short and looked up at Patrick’s disgustingly sincere face. “Oh, you’re serious?”

Patrick shrugged. “Yeah, why not? I mean, I basically already taught it to myself. Why not teach another person?”

David couldn’t help but laugh. “Um, maybe because my parents had to fire my last math tutor because they found out I’d been hooking up with him and using it as a bargaining chip to get him to do my homework for me?”

For some incomprehensible and completely frustrating reason, Patrick cocked his head with half a smile. “Does that technically count as prostitution?”

“Um, I don’t think so? Because the reason I went after him in the first place was just because he was hot and I heard he was a really good lay, and it was only afterwards that I realized I could use it as blackmail, which I then did because I am a trash person. And the only reason I knew I could do that was because before him was Andre, who had been fired because my sister Alexis was hooking up with him, so. Long story short, my previous math tutoring attempts have not been very successful.” He paused. “Well, at least on the math front. Gian  _ was _ a good lay.”

“Wow,” Patrick said, blinking. “Well, luckily for you, I wouldn’t be doing it as your math tutor, because I don’t have that kind of time, and you can’t pay me.”

“Okay, rude.”

“But not untrue,” Patrick said, but somehow it wasn’t mean, because this kid had some kind of magic where he could constantly give David shit and yet never make David feel bad about it. “I could just help you as like, a math… friend.”

David shot him a look. “Us as friends, can you imagine?”

“Okay fine, a math acquaintance,” Patrick conceded, and was David imagining things, or did he deflate a little at that? And as David was thinking about how he maybe came on a little too strong (but honestly, when was he not overly standoffish and aloof?) and wondering how he could roll that back to wipe the sad and thinly veiled puppy dog expression off of Patrick’s face, he realized that, once again, he had not actually responded to him.

“Look,” Patrick said. “I’ll give you my number, and if you find yourself being actively murdered by pre-calc at any point in the future, just text me.” 

He held a hand out expectantly, and David wondered what kind of person Patrick thought he was if he expected him to just  _ hand  _ his phone over to a near-stranger — okay fine, an acquaintance — to have free reign over his unlocked phone under the guise of putting their number in. And then David looked at Patrick, got lost in this basic-ass farm boy’s kind eyes, and immediately became that kind of person, dumbly handing his phone over before allowing himself to think better of it. 

And when David checked his contact list later and found that Patrick had put a little calculator emoji next to his name, he did not find it cute at all. No, it was definitely tacky, and tonight he would be telling Stevie all about how presumptuous it was for Patrick to assume he could  _ fix _ all of David’s math problems and how Patrick and his seemingly infinite collection of blue henleys of various shades was very tacky and not at all cute. Not at all.

* * *

David didn’t want to text Patrick for math help. He really didn’t. Especially since it had only been two days since Patrick gave him his number, and David did  _ not _ want to look desperate. Like, he was, especially since as a result of there being nothing to do in this town Johnny had recently taken an interest in making sure his kids didn’t fail school and kept hounding David about his tanking math grade, but David didn’t need Patrick to know that. 

But it was 11:30pm and he had his first chapter test tomorrow and this practice test that he was trying to do made no fucking sense. And Alexis laying on her bed with a face mask on telling him to “Just do it  _ better _ , David, your bad vibes are ruining the effectiveness of my mask,” was most assuredly not helping. Neither was Stevie, who despite having the same test tomorrow said, “If I don’t know it now I won’t know it ever, so you’re on your own, chum. Have fun disappointing your dad!” Which was wrong on simply so many levels, starting and ending with her use of the word “chum”. 

So in a moment of weakness, he texted Patrick. 

Less than a minute later, his phone was buzzing with Patrick’s response — and of course Patrick texted with perfect capitalization and punctuation and grammar like a 50-year-old soccer mom, of  _ course  _ he did. 

And of course he was actually helpful and explained things in a way that David’s two remaining brain cells could actually parse out, and an hour and a half later, he found himself relatively confident that his odds of failing had dropped from a full 100% to a measly 75%. So David swallowed his pride and bit his tongue and sent Patrick a “thank you”.

The three dots showing that Patrick was typing showed up almost immediately, and David found himself oddly nervous. Which was crazy. Why was he nervous about what this buttoned-up straight boy said in response to his reluctant yet honest appreciation? And yet here he was. 

_ Any time, David. Although in the future might I recommend asking for help more than 14 hours before the test? Just for the sake of your own sanity. And GPA. _

David smiled at Patrick’s sass despite himself, and shot back a reply. 

**it’s a miracle I even asked you for help at all Brewer**

**don’t push it**

_ Well then in that case, the honor was all mine.  _

_ But I do have to go now. I’ve got a student council meeting at 6:30 tomorrow morning, and I don’t want to lose any more sleep than I already have. Night, David.  _

David stared blankly at his phone for a moment. He managed (with some difficulty) to put aside his absolute horror over the outright insanity of holding student council meetings  _ before school _ to consider that he might have been keeping Patrick up helping him. Of course he had been, because Patrick was  _ nice  _ and David was self-centered (according to several different therapists) and needy (according to every last one of his exes) and stupid (according to the astonishingly poor self-confidence he had in any part of him but his dick). 

Before David could let himself spiral too far, he exerted a serious amount of self control by sending back a simple “goodnight” and reminding himself that he was an idiot who needed to stop getting invested in what popular farmboys out in hick country thought of him. Then, when that didn’t stop him from getting his hopes up and smiling like a smitten schoolgirl at the thought that  _ maybe _ Patrick staying up to help him  _ meant _ something, he threw his phone across the room. Because it didn’t mean anything. And he was  _ not  _ smitten, he wasn’t. In fact, he was so disbelieving that it meant anything and so not smitten that he was going to refuse to tell Stevie that he actually took Patrick up on his offer, because why would she need to know about his growing relationship with a random kid he sat near in art class? She would probably just make fun of him for bringing Patrick up a second time in one week and  _ she’d _ call David smitten and he simply could not stand for that kind of baseless slander. 

But if he spent the rest of that night’s waking hours letting himself exist in an imaginary world where Patrick was staying up to help him because he actually liked him, and not just because he pitied him, that was nobody’s business but his own. It certainly wasn’t Stevie’s. 


	3. Chapter 3

“So you just… text each other?” Stevie asked, walking next to David on the way to lunch. “And you talk in class, and he helps you with math, and then you don’t acknowledge each other outside of that?” 

David made a face as they dodged a pair of freshmen going at it against the lockers. “Okay, we do not text each other that much. It’s mostly about school stuff, anyway.”

“Right. School stuff like, ‘Hey Patrick, why are you spending so much time helping me with my homework for a class you’re not even in,” and ‘Hey Patrick, I heard you and Rachel are going to homecoming in a group of friends instead of with each other, which is kind of crazy, especially since two months into your semi-annual breakup you’re usually already back together. Is that because you’re actually wildly in love with me?’” 

“He is  _ not _ into me. He wears straight leg, mid range denim.”

Stevie shot David an  _ are-you-kidding-me  _ look as they sat down in the cafeteria. “Oh, so you can go off at people when they clock you as gay based on the way you look, but it’s okay when you clock Patrick as straight based on the way  _ he  _ looks? Literally everyone wears straight leg, mid range denim in this town.”

“Yes, and it’s a travesty. Look, I’m just informing the masses about the spectrum that is queerness, Stevie. They need to learn to look beyond the gay-straight binary,” David said, waving his hands so wildly that Stevie had to move her sandwich to save it from getting thrown off the table. “And it’s not my fault that Patrick just so happens to give off aggressively straight vibes.”

“I just don’t agree with you on that one, though. Somewhere beyond all those repressed Catholic boy vibes, there’s something new happening here. You didn’t know him before — he’s different with you.”

“You’ve never even  _ seen _ him with me, because we don’t interact at all outside of class, because we’re not even friends. Also, I highly doubt that you’re the most qualified to be the Patrick Brewer personality expert at this school.”

“Okay, you have  _ shown _ me the texts, and the way he’s talking to you is nothing like the way he ever talked to Rachel.”

David scoffed. “Yeah, because he’s into Rachel and he’s not into me.”

“But Rachel is clearly still into him, and they’re like, Schitt’s Creek power couple number one. If he’s also into Rachel, why are they still broken up?”

“Um, because they’re teenagers and that’s what we do? You know how many people I’ve broken up with just because I was bored?”

“Did you break up with them, though, or did they dump you?”

“Fuck off,” David said. “I’m never smoking with you again.”

Stevie shrugged. “Not my fault you get chatty high.”

“But definitely your fault for bribing me with Doritos.”

“You would never stand up under questioning in a hostage situation. All it takes is a handful of chips and BAM, your captors know everything about you.”

“Are you threatening to hold me hostage?”

“If you don’t admit you have a crush on Patrick, maybe.”

David looked positively affronted at this. “Woah, when did this become about me? I thought this was about the crush that Patrick absolutely does not have on me.”

“Well, I think now’s as good a time as any to pivot to you,” Stevie said with a truly demonic grin.

“I’m not  _ into _ Patrick, thank you very much. No one here is into anyone else. Can we talk about something else please?”

“Sure, if you promise to come to the homecoming game tomorrow.”

“Stevie,” David said, completely seriously, “you should know by now that if you want me to go to a sportsing event, you will have to knock me out and drag my unconscious body there.”

“Although absolutely decking you is tempting, I don’t think I have the upper body strength to drag you all the way to the football field, even if it was just from here.”

“Glad that’s sorted, then.”

Stevie groaned. “Come  _ on _ , David. It’s dumb hot guys getting sweaty and smashing into each other. What’s not to like?”

“Um, the insane patriarchal values, heteronormative expectations, and sexist gender roles that go into the entire culture surrounding both the dance and sports aspect of homecoming? Also, the concussions?”

“But just think. If you go, could could smash those heteronormative expectations by ogling the cheerleaders _and_ the football players.”

“Or, we could smash those heteronormative expectations by boycotting the entire event.”

“Look, I am happy to skip the horny grind-fest that is the homecoming dance. But you’re coming to the game with me, whether you like it or not.” David made a face at this, and Stevie whacked his arm with a carrot stick. “Welcome to the heartland, baby, you’re about to get a  _ real _ American high school experience.”

* * *

Sometime in the first quarter of the game (or was this game in halves? David had always been annoyed that all sports didn’t have the same timing and scoring rules), David spotted Alexis flouncing around the stands in a yellow designer dress that somehow still managed to convey some level of spirit for the frankly offensive color scheme of this hellhole school. She trailed after Mutt and a girl who David recognized from the cafe — Tilly? Tana? — looking out of place, but in a diamond in the rough kind of way, as she mingled amongst the plebian farmhands of this town.

David, however, outright refused to associate with those people, and stood out like a sore thumb in his classic David Rose all-black getup. Stevie had at least tried to dress on theme, sort of blending in with her hunter green flannel in a sea of yellow-and-green clad students, but at David’s request — nay, demand — they sat a little further back in the stands, away from the crowds and hormones of the student section. Neither of them, to Stevie’s credit, was particularly interested in partaking in the organized cheering and general rowdiness that was being led by a group of students at the front of the stands with a giant flag adorned by Billy Bob the Beaver, which, with its exaggeratedly large teeth, was perhaps the most profoundly ugly school mascot David had ever seen.

On the field, someone got tackled, the ref blew his whistle, and the crowd cheered. Someone waved the flag of Billy Bob the Beaver back and forth with gusto, but David had literally no idea what had just happened. 

“Okay, I have a complaint about this activity,” David said.

Stevie huffed. “Course you do.”

“This sport is called football, but literally no one has touched their foot to the ball yet.”

“Um, not true. The game starts out with a kickoff. And because Elm Valley is so shit, they’ve already punted twice. Also, we’ve scored a field goal. All of those things require touching your foot to the ball, you’re just not paying attention.”

“In my defense, all the disturbing fashion at this event is very distracting. The shoulder pads are very clunky.”

“Well, we can’t all look as good as David Rose.”

“Damn right you can’t,” David said, and Stevie turned back to the field with a laugh.

After a moment of contented game-watching on Stevie’s part and highly confused game-watching on David’s part, she asked, in a way that was probably meant to be casual but absolutely was not, “You seen Patrick around anywhere?” 

David bristled. “Why would I have done that?”

Stevie shrugged. “Wondered if maybe this was one of the school-related things you were allowed to text about under the terms of your acquaintanceship agreement. If he knew you were here, maybe he would want to say hi.”

“He would not want to say  _ hi _ .”

“Twenty bucks that he comes over and says something to you before this game is over.”

“Uh, sure, because he won’t. Even if he does see me, he’ll—”

“Oh, he’ll see you.”

David rolled his eyes. “Watch your stupid concussion sport.”

* * *

Intermission was the first time David spotted Patrick down in the stands — it wasn’t like he’d been  _ looking _ , thank you very much, it was just that the stands had thinned out a bit with people going for concessions. Nonetheless, Patrick was clapping and cheering alongside his group of grinning, barbaric friends as the band played the school’s theme song. Fight song? It was a song, was all David knew, and frankly it wasn’t very good. 

And because he was very pointedly  _ not _ looking and  _ not _ staring, it wasn’t until Patrick was a few stairs away from him and Stevie at the top of the stands that David saw him coming. David tried, very quickly, to duck behind Stevie in the most surreptitious way possible, but unfortunately the movement seemed to have the opposite effect, and Patrick glanced over and met his eyes. 

And because Patrick was  _ nice _ , and for no other reason, he grinned at David, stepping out of the way of foot traffic and stopping at the bench in front of David and Stevie.

“David,” he said, hands shoved deep in his pockets, “I’m surprised to see you here.”

“As am I,” David said, glaring at Stevie. 

“Hey Stevie,” Patrick said, almost as if noticing her for the first time.

“Hello Patrick,” she said. Her eyes were on Patrick, but David could just  _ feel _ that the grin on her face was directed at him. 

David gave Patrick an admittedly slightly judgemental once-over, because 1) Patrick had some sort of black paint smeared under his eyes for no apparent reason, and 2) he was in a green “Beavers Baseball” t-shirt without anything over it and the night was far too windy for him not to be freezing. David decided addressing the latter was more pressing. “Why the hell are you wearing short sleeves?”

Patrick glanced down, hands digging somehow further into his pockets. “Oh, uh… I gave my sweatshirt to Rachel. She underestimated how cold it was gonna be, and I was still representing SC with this shirt underneath, so.”

“How… chivalrous,” David said diplomatically.

“Mm, and where’s your school spirit? Surprised to not see you decked out in yellow and green.”

“Bold of you to think I would own anything in either one of those colors, much less something that combines the two.”

“I would never,” Patrick said seriously, but that damn glint in his eye was back. How did his eyes say so much?

“Interesting, because it seems like you just did,” David shot back. 

Patrick smiled. “Okay, David. Well, if I don’t come back with drinks before halftime is over I’ll never be forgiven, so I’ve gotta go do that, but... good to see you. Enjoy the game,” he said, giving David’s arm a pat as he passed by, which made David briefly start because it was  _ surprising _ , that was all. 

“I won’t,” he called after Patrick’s retreating back.

And just like he had a few weeks prior in an empty hallway, Patrick turned back to David to throw his response over his shoulder with a grin. “Oh, I know.”

As soon as he got lost in the crowd, Stevie turned to David, eyes sparkling dangerously. “So where’s my twenty bucks?” 

“Fuck off,” David snapped.

* * *

David tapped absently at the dashboard as Stevie dug through the center console of her absolute lemon of a car.

“I just like, don’t understand it though,” he said.

“Ha! Success!” Stevie cried victoriously, emerging from with a gleeful look in her eyes and ratty old aux cord. “What don’t you understand?” she asked as she plugged her phone in and started scrolling through music. 

“That… black eye stuff. That everyone was wearing.”

“Eye black? It absorbs the sun so it doesn’t get in your eyes when you’re playing.”

“Okay, but it was dark out for basically the entire game. And half the people wearing it were spectators! So it’s obviously some sort of solidarity thing or sports fashion statement, but like, it’s ugly. And I’m sure they use some girl’s expired drugstore eyeliner to smear it all over everyone’s faces, which is NOT hygienic. It just doesn’t make any sense.”

The interior of the car went dark as Stevie took it out of park and started making her way out of the crowded parking lot. “You seem very fixated on this.”

“Well, yeah. I pride myself on understanding fashion and trends, but this is one backwater trend that I simply cannot wrap my head around.”

“Right, and it has nothing to do with the fact that Patrick was wearing it?”

David glared at her, although he couldn’t quite make out the expression on her face in the dark. “What?"

“Patrick was wearing eye black. Is that maybe why you’re paying so much attention to it?”

“I don’t see why that would make any difference,” David said, crossing his arms like a petulant child.

Stevie just shook her head and laughed. “Oh my god David, you are the stupidest motherfucker on this entire planet.” 

* * *

David and Stevie were almost to the end of their second bad slasher film of the night, most of the way through a giant bag of Cheetos, and all the way through one of Stevie’s better joints by the time Alexis came back to the motel, looking just as perfectly put together as she had been when she left for the dance hours ago. “Ew,” she said, eyeing the TV as she fluttered around the room, setting her things down and taking off her shoes. “Why do you watch those things?”

“Why are you even home?” David countered. “What, Mutt doesn’t bring girls back to the Schitt house when his parents are around?”

Alexis looked at him blankly. “Mutt?”

“Um, yeah, Mutt. He’s been driving you around all month, in case you hadn’t noticed?”

“Ugh, keep up, David, I didn’t go to homecoming with Mutt, Twyla did. I went with Ted, and he is  _ such _ a little gentleman. Not sure how long I’ll be able to take it, but it’s a very cute look for right now.”

“I bet it is,” Stevie said, mock-seriously. Then, because she was an evil person, she asked, “Any  _ hot goss _ on the Patrick-Rachel front?”

David shot Stevie the angriest look his slightly-under the influence self could muster, but Alexis didn’t notice, plowing through her scattered things and sitting down across from them on her bed. “They hung out a lot, but they didn’t dance together for  _ any _ of the slow dances,” she said, twirling her hair conspiratorially. “Some people still think they’re gonna get back together eventually, but like, I’m not so sure, because I ran into him by the drinks and tried the whole  _ fixing-his-tie _ trick—”

“I thought you liked Ted,” David interjected, not at all defensively. 

“I do,” she said, as if it was obvious, “but I’m not gonna miss my chance at one of the hottest pieces of ass at this school. But it like, didn’t work at all. I went all in, too, and he was so nice, he’s a sweet little button face, but he totally shut me down. And in my experience, that either means a guy is really hung up on an ex, or he’s gay.” At that, she tapped her knee in a way that was meaningful to only those who spoke fluent Alexis. 

“Yeah, well Rachel—”

“What did I  _ just _ say, David? They didn’t even slow dance together!”

“Okay, but why were you even paying so much attention?” David asked.

“It’s very important that I keep up with all the hot tea, David,” Alexis said, hands waving about. “It’s like, the first cardinal rule of high school. Also, you talk about Patrick like, all the time. And you’re constantly over there smiling at your phone when you’re doing your math homework, and like, you didn’t even get that excited about math when Gian was around. You’re not exactly subtle. So really, you’re welcome for my discoveries tonight."

Stevie looked at David. “Told you so.”

“See,” Alexis said, getting up and heading towards the bathroom. “Stevie gets it. You should go for it, David.”

David glared at them both in turn. “I am  _ not _ liking this unbalanced social dynamic.”

“Really?” Stevie asked, mouth full of Cheeto, “Because I’m loving it.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flirting, but make it blood. Spicy!

David was dreading checking his math grade. He’d been putting it off for days, finding every possible excuse (of which there were very few) to not go online and just rip the band-aid off. Simply ignoring a problem was a tried and true method for him, and he did not regret employing it. What he did regret, however, was telling Patrick about it. 

“Haven’t you gotten hard copies of tests and quizzes back? So you should at least have a general idea of your grade, right?” Patrick asked in class one afternoon. 

David eyed him as he took an eraser to his most recent failed artistic creation. “Oh my god, _gentler,_ ” David said, “You’re not scrubbing burnt cheese off the page, you’re just erasing. You’re gonna rip the paper.”

Patrick looked up with a mischievous smile. “I find it hard to believe that you’ve done a large quantity of scrubbing in your life, so I’m really interested in the specificity of this burnt cheese thing.”

“Shut up.” David turned faintly pink and looked back at his own work — he was absolutely _not_ telling Patrick about the failed enchilada experiment. “For your information, I _have_ gotten some of my tests back, but I still don’t really have a good feel for my grade because, as I have mentioned, I am _bad at math_. And also, I really don’t want to know.”

“Okay, but given that you keep talking about it, I kind of think you do.”

“No, my dad just keeps hounding me about it and it’s annoying. Like, okay fine, try to actually be a parent to me and Alexis for like a week or two. But it’s been a month and it’s getting kind of out of hand. Honestly, I think he’s just bored.”

“I mean, there are worse things to do when you’re bored than care about your kids.”

David glared at him. “What are you, a middle aged guidance counselor? You’re supposed to be on my side here.”

“Oh, am I?”

“Um, yeah. I go, ‘parents all suck’, and then you’re supposed to go, ‘I know right?’ It’s… teenage solidarity, or something.”

“Mm, I see,” he said, and then leaned back in his chair and looked over to Ms. Segal, who was watching some of the students work at the next table over. “Hey, Ms. Segal, is it okay if David uses his phone for a second?”

“As long as his shading assignment is ready to be turned in by the end of class tomorrow, I don’t care what David does,” she said without looking up from Aubrey’s frankly horrid drawing of a vase.

David eyed Patrick warily. “What is this, a weird teacher’s pet attempt at teenage solidarity?”

“Get your phone out and check your grade, David.”

“Ugh, no.”

“Yes,” Patrick chided, like he was talking to a toddler, not someone who was a full month and three quarters older than him. (Did David know Patrick’s birthday from Facebook stalking him? Maybe. But in his defense, Patrick once mentioned offhand that his birthday was in August, and David simply had to confirm whether he was a leo or a virgo. It was for science.)

(He was a virgo, for the record. Which was very compatible with cancer. Not that it mattered.)

It took ten minutes, but somehow Patrick managed to get Ms. Segal involved and of course she took his side, the little suck-up, and so David found himself holding his phone as far away from his face as possible as he reluctantly clicked on his math grade. 

And what he found there was… not bad. 

It was not good, to be sure. But it was not bad. David had certainly done worse. 

Patrick raised his eyebrows at him. “And?”

David shrugged in a way that was meant to be nonchalant, but he wasn’t sure if he pulled it off. “It is… adequate.”

Patrick raised his arms in success. “Did you hear that, Ms. Segal? David’s adequate! David ‘Adequate’ Rose strikes again!”

“Okay, that’s enough,” David snapped, even as he suppressed a smile that was definitely at the golf clap Ms. Segal gave as she walked away and not at all to do with Patrick. “Doesn’t mean it won’t nosedive like, tomorrow. We started a new chapter today and I’m already confused.”

Patrick just shrugged it off, as if he _believed_ in David or something, which, what? “You’ll be fine. But if you text tonight I might not answer til late, I’ve got practice.”

David dropped his phone and looked up at Patrick in confusion. “Practice? For what?”

“Hockey. Preseason started this week.”

“You play hockey?”

“I’m the captain,” Patrick said, sitting up a little straighter. 

“Bold of you to think I would know whether the captain plays or not.”

Patrick laughed. “Yes, I play.”

David scrunched his nose distastefully. “Isn’t that sport like, barbaric? You guys punch each other when the judge makes a bad call or whatever?”

“I mean, you’re not supposed to, but yeah, it happens. I’ve never gotten put in the box for it, though.”

“Is ‘the box’ when you get put in time out?”

Patrick grinned like David had something funny, despite the fact that he’d asked a perfectly logical question. “Time out is a different thing, but that’s the idea, yes.”

“Well, sounds horrible.”

“The box or the sport?”

“All of it.”

“Oh come on, David, you should come to a game. I think you’d actually like it.”

David shot him the sharpest, most disbelieving look he could muster. “Yeah right.”

Patrick just laughed again, which was frankly becoming rude. “Alright fine, you’d like looking at the novel selection of hot hockey boys from the greater Elmdale region.”

“Seeing hot hockey boys is what we have Instagram for.”

“Yeah, but imagine seeing them in the flesh.”

“Not worth it,” David said, and he was not thinking about how he already got to see a hot hockey boy in the flesh on the daily. And he was not thinking about what Stevie and Alexis had said the night of homecoming, and he did not let his subconscious wonder for half a second if Patrick was calling these hockey boys hot just for David’s benefit, or if he himself actually thought they were hot. 

Because that was stupid. Of course it was stupid. Patrick didn’t like boys. Right? Patrick didn’t like boys. 

“I’ll wear you down eventually,” Patrick said with another one of those stupid grins, and despite David’s miraculous level of control over his subconscious, he was still very, very afraid that this dumbass sports boy just might.

* * *

“He wants to see you outside of school. If you think that doesn’t mean anything, you’re delusional,” Stevie said, pushing the cleaning cart into room four as David trailed after her. 

“I’m not delusional, I’m _realistic_. He’s just the kind of small town nice person who invites random classmates to hockey performances.” David went to sit down on the bed, but Stevie immediately shoved him out of the way. David made a face and sat down at the desk as Stevie took to stripping the bed. 

“He’s never invited me to a hockey game.”

“Yeah, but have you ever had a class with him?”

“Um, yeah. It’s not like this school is _big_ , I’ve got second hour with him.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yes, really, he sits at the front and raises his hand to answer Mrs. Schitt’s questions like the good suck-up he is.”

“Why have you never mentioned this to me?”

Stevie looked at David faux-innocently, somehow managing to wield a hideous beige decorative pillow like a weapon. “Well, you told me you didn’t like him like that and you were just math acquaintances, so I didn’t deem it necessary to bring up.” David glared back at her and she just grinned as she (rudely) teased, “Whatever will you do while he’s at hockey? Stare at your phone longingly, yearning for a text from your math acquaintance that will never come?”

“Actually,” David said, arms flailing wildly, “it’s a major inconvenience that this horrid ice sport is keeping my math acquaintance from giving me the math assistance that I require in this trying time.”

“Sure,” Stevie shot back drily, “this is _totally_ about math.”

David pointedly ignored her. “Like, if it’s not ice dancing what even is the point?”

“I don’t know, but maybe you’d find out if you actually went to the game he invited you to.”

David crossed his arms. “I’m not going to a fucking hockey game. I don’t care how cute he is.” As soon as those last few words left his mouth, he regretted it, which meant Stevie glommed onto it immediately, stepping towards him with a downright evil grin on her face. 

“Oh, so now you’ll admit you think he’s cute?”

David reddened, shoving her back in the general direction of the cleaning cart. “Shut the fuck up. I’m not going to a fucking hockey game.”

* * *

A few weeks later, David found himself at a fucking hockey game. 

It wasn’t even Stevie who convinced him to go, either (although he most assuredly dragged her along as penance for all the shit she was constantly giving him) — in the end it was Patrick’s stupid, pleading puppy dog eyes that did him in. And now he was sitting in an exceedingly cold building with Morgan Currie not-so-subtly giving him side-eye on the other end of the stands and David really wanted to snap, “Yes, I’m just as surprised I’m here as you are, so you can stop staring now,” but he didn’t, because he had remarkable self-control. 

As it was, he was mostly just watching the players warm up and seething at the student section’s choice of pre-game chant, which was something to do with “how much puck could a Schitt’s Creek Beaver puck”, and it was _not_ a cute look.

“That doesn’t even make sense,” David said, gesturing at Stevie with a nacho. “Woodchucks and beavers aren’t the same thing, and even if they were, ‘Schitt’s Creek Beaver’ is twice as many syllables as ‘woodchuck’, so the cadence gets all messed up. And don’t even get me _started_ on the horrible pun involved.”

Stevie leaned back, putting her feet up on the row in front of them. “I have a feeling you’re going to get started anyway.”

“‘Puck’ isn’t a verb!”

“How would you know? You only learned the word ten minutes ago.”

David had a very good rebuttal prepared, thank you very much, but at that moment they were interrupted by one Rachel Farber walking up to them, arms full of the most _hideous_ green and yellow abominations David had ever seen. 

“Want some foam fingers?” she asked with a smile, friendly as ever despite never having spoken to David once in her life. “They’re free for students.”

“Sure,” Stevie said reaching for them, immediately putting one on that read _SCHITT’S #1_ (what did that even _mean_?) and waving the flimsy monstrosity obnoxiously in David’s face. “Take one, David.”

David eyed it disdainfully, batting Stevie’s arm away. “I am _not_ touching that. It’s perhaps the most disturbing thing I have ever seen.”

“Well in that case, can I have two?” Stevie asked.

Rachel laughed. “Go for it. Mrs. Schitt ordered more of these things than there are people in this entire town.” With a gleeful smile, Stevie reached over David and snagged another foam finger as Rachel continued, “I’m surprised to see you guys here, actually. Obviously we’re always happy to add to the student section, but I didn’t really peg you as a hockey kind of guy, David.”

Stevie looked pointedly at David. “Yeah David, tell me, why _are_ we here? Because I recall it being your idea.”

David shot a glare in her direction before turning to Rachel and reluctantly answering, “Patrick invited me. I thought it’d be rude to decline.”

Rachel started a little at that, although the smile never left her face. David kind of wanted to hate her for it, but she was so incredibly nice and that smile of hers was so genuine that he simply couldn’t. No wonder Patrick liked her — they were basically perfect for each other. “Oh, I didn’t realize you two were friends,” she said.

“We have art together,” David explained. “We are… acquaintances.”

“Yeah,” Stevie chimed in very unhelpfully, “acquaintances who beg each other to come to their sporting events and who subsequently go to those sporting events even though they hate sports.”

“Oh,” Rachel said, clearly not sure what to make of this. “Uh. Okay. Well, thanks for coming. I’ll see you guys around.”

As soon as she was out of earshot, David turned and looked Stevie right in the eye. “I will slit your fucking throat.”

“What?” she asked, stealing one of David’s nachos. “I’m just elaborating on some details of your innocent, totally normal acquaintanceship with Patrick to a person who just so happens to be his ex. Regular small talk.” 

David just groaned, snatching his nachos out of her reach, but he couldn’t find it in him to actually refute any of it this time. Maybe once he was full of more artificial cheese he’d feel re-energized to fight Stevie for Patrick’s honor, but as it stood, he was just kind of hangry, so he spent the rest of the players’ warm-up time with his face in his food, whilst occasionally ducking to avoid Stevie’s attempts to poke him in the face with her foam fingers.

Eventually, the game started, and while David would be the first to admit that he didn’t know the first thing about this (or any) sport, it was hard to not notice that Patrick was good. He wasn’t the best player, necessarily, but he was solidly _good_. David watched as some players tussled in the center of the rink, sticks whacking at each other — and then Patrick emerged from the fray and went skating away with the puck before David had even properly spotted it to begin with. “You think there’s anything he’s not good at?” David asked Stevie absently.

“Aw, is competence a turn-on for you?” she asked. David turned to glare at her, but her eyes stayed laser-focused on the game even as her mouth twitched into a smile. 

“Are you quite done?”

“I won’t stop until you stop fawning over him.”

“I am not _fawning_ over anyone—”

“Oh, so we’re at this game because of your deep love of ice-related contact sports? Better go find Rachel and correct the record then, because you told _her_ that—”

“Shut up. You’re a demon.” Stevie just shrugged and kept watching. 

Sometime towards the beginning of what Stevie informed him was the third period (in what universe anyone thought it was a good idea to break up a game into thirds, David had no idea), David’s interest was piqued when the hot blonde on Elmdale’s team (what was David going to do, _disagree_ with Patrick that these Elmdale hockey boys were easy on the eyes?) got all up in the face of a Schitt’s Creek player — it was hard to tell from here but he was pretty sure it was a guy in his English class named Jake. David wasn’t actually sure what had started the disagreement — when a guy behind them started prattling on about a “dubiously legal check into the boards”, David asked Stevie what that meant and she had just shrugged — but Hot Blonde was getting _feisty_.

The judge-man in the striped shirt was yelling something unintelligible and waving his arms all around as he skated over to the commotion, but Hot Blonde paid no mind, yelling at Jake and skating him into a corner. Most of David’s intel on Jake up to that point (primarily collected by drooling at him from across his English classroom) indicated that Jake was something of a non-violent, _love everyone_ hippie, so it was clear to him that when Jake shoved the kid aside, it was mostly for the purpose of just trying to get past him. Hot Blonde, however, took this as a personal affront and swung back with full force, landing a punch on one of those beautiful, beautiful cheekbones. Almost immediately, the skirmish turned into a full-out brawl, with other players from both teams getting involved — some apparently to break up the fight, others just to take some of their pent-up teenage energy out on an Elmdale random, David supposed. 

“Holy _fuck_ ,” Stevie cried, leaning in to watch. “This is better than football! Why haven’t I been coming to these things all along?”

It seemed like everything was playing out in slow motion as Patrick tried to get in between Jake and the Elmdale kid with a placating arm outstretched, only for Hot Blonde to turn his fury onto Patrick himself and, to David’s horror, punch _him_ in the face. 

Patrick’s nose started bleeding almost immediately. He tipped his head back with an annoyed expression that indicated he was used to this, blindly spitting his mouth guard out onto the ice (which, gross) before the blood made it to his mouth. 

As the other players backed away from the blood, the fight was interrupted enough that the judge-man was able to skate in and get everything under control. Once he had sufficiently yelled at Hot Blonde, he turned to talk to Patrick. After a moment, with a groan that David could feel more than hear or see, Patrick reluctantly reached down and picked his mouth guard off the ice. He used his other hand to pinch the bridge of his nose as he skated over towards the little player door on the side of the rink, presumably to get a tampon stuck up his nose or something. 

David hadn’t even realized that he had jumped to his feet to watch the scene unfold until Stevie tugged at his sleeve with a smirk. “Worried about your math acquaintance, huh?”

He sat down with a huff. “In a perfectly friendly and normal way, sure. But mostly I was just very concerned about blood getting all over the ice and delaying the game, because if a stupid fight delays my ability to go home at a decent time, I will be _very_ displeased.”

“You realize we can leave at literally any time, right?”

David sighed. “I promised Patrick I would come say hi to him after the game.”

Stevie propped her chin on her hand in a manner that was astoundingly condescending. “Because he liiiiiikes you.”

“No, because we’re fr — we’re acquaintances,” David corrected himself quickly. 

“Sure. And given that I’m your ride, what if I want to go home before then?”

“We’re staying,” David said, turning back to the ice as the judge-man blew a whistle and playing re-commenced. 

“Ooh, you should really show this take-charge side of you to Patrick. I think he’d like it.”

David ignored her. 

* * *

“Why are you meeting him _outside_?” Stevie asked, following David out of the ice rink. David leaned against the building, arms crossed against the cold.

“I don’t know, I didn’t want to make him think he had to like, talk to me in front of everyone else.”

“He invited you to see him play, David, I don’t think he’s going to draw the line at being seen with you.” She eyed him carefully. “What’s this actually about? Is this one of your weird… things?”

David shrugged, staring off at the distant road. “People talk about me enough already, and me coming here tonight definitely didn’t help. I don’t need to… I don’t know, I don’t need to _invite_ more of that by being seen with someone who’s popular, and well-liked, and is very clearly in different social circles than me.”

“I don’t think it counts as a social _circle_ if I’m your only friend.”

“Thanks for the feedback.”

They stood in silence for a few moments. “Fuck it, if you’re gonna make me wait for you, I’m gonna go get some more nachos. Have fun talking to your boyfriend,” Stevie said, already halfway to the door.

“ _Stop it_ ,” David hissed, but she just grinned and was gone. 

After what felt like forever to David, who was increasingly convinced that Patrick was standing him up, but was probably less than two minutes, Patrick came outside, a giant hockey bag slung over his shoulder. He smiled as soon as he spotted David.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” David said, floundering a bit when he realized he had no idea what to say to someone after they sportsed. “Nice… win.”

Patrick looked at him blankly. “What are you talking about?”

“The… sporting event you just dragged me to?”

“But we didn’t win. Hockey is scored like golf, the lower the better.” David’s eyes widened. He could’ve _sworn_ that points were good in this stupid sport, but — “I’m kidding,” Patrick said, looking way too pleased with himself. “We won.”

David slumped back against the wall, and Patrick set his bag down nearby, mirroring him. “You’re rude,” David replied.

Predictably, Patrick just smiled, and David couldn’t help but notice that there was a fleck of dried blood that hadn’t come off, right above his lip. “Thanks for coming.”

“Mm. This is a very violent sport.”

Patrick laughed. “A little. I do promise that me getting caught up in fights is not a regular occurrence, though.”

“I don’t know, you kind of looked like a nosebleed expert.”

“In my poor nose’s defense, a gust of wind blowing the wrong direction could give me a nosebleed.”

David tamped down his smile, because who smiles at someone telling you they have a weak, bleedy nose? “Mine was like that before I got my nose job.”

Patrick spluttered. “You’ve had a _nose job_?”

“What, you think I come by all this beauty naturally?”

“Um, yes?” 

David stopped short. Patrick couldn’t have _meant_ that, right? Like, he had to just be being nice. He didn’t think David was, was _beautiful_ or something, and even if he did it was absolutely not in a gay way. Right? David knew it was his own fault for walking right on into that one but he was spiraling a bit and then Patrick cleared his throat awkwardly and dear god, he’d neglected to respond to him again. 

“So,” Patrick asked, with that _stupid_ smile, “is all of your face fake, then? Are you actually just an alien underneath a bunch of plastic surgery?

“As far as I’m aware,” David said, recovering, “I’ve just had the nose job. But who knows what my parents had done to me as a child that they're hiding from me. Maybe I was born too ugly for them.”

“I highly doubt that’s possible.”

“Well, you’ve never met my parents. You’d be astounded by what they’re capable of.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

What the fuck. What the actual fuck. What was David supposed to say to that? Was he dreaming? What was happening? 

So David did maybe the stupidest thing he could think of, which was to blurt out, “You still have some blood on your face.”

What the _fuck_ was David doing?

To Patrick’s credit, he didn’t flinch. “Then wipe it off.”

Unfortunately, his unflappability did not rub off on David, who just blinked at Patrick’s stupid smirking face and stupid sparkly eyes. Was this flirting? Was that what was happening, some sort of weird, boonie, blood-related come on? In his 17 years, David had flirted with everyone and their brother (literally) and had countless flirtatious statements volleyed back at him, but nothing had ever made him feel like this, like he couldn’t decide if he wanted to grab Patrick by the face and kiss him or if he wanted to run away as far as possible, or maybe both. 

“You want me to… rub the blood off your face?”

“Sure.” How the _hell_ was Patrick being so calm about this? Did this mean he _wasn’t_ flirting? Was this just some deranged, normal acquaintance behavior out in middle America? 

Luckily, David was able to collect his wits enough to recognize the last logical thought bouncing around somewhere in the haze of the back of his head, and said, “I am absolutely not touching your blood. That can’t be hygienic. Do it yourself.”

“Well,” Patrick said, teasing, “I can’t see where it is, you see, because it’s my face.”

“Find a mirror! Or use your phone! I’m not touching your blood!” David cried at an alarmingly high pitch. His brain was either panicking about flirting or panicking about touching another person’s blood, it seemed, and there was no in between. 

Patrick’s eyes just did even more _sparkling_ in the low light outside the rink, and god _dammit_. “How about this,” he said, and then he had the audacity to _lick his thumb_ and hold it up, as if David was supposed to know what to do with this. 

“What the fuck?”

“You don’t have to touch my blood. You just have to touch my hand.”

And David, because he had no control over his facilities when it came to Patrick fucking Brewer, just rolled his eyes and fucking… did it. He grabbed Patrick’s hand and guided his thumb to the spot just over his lip and — 

It was awkward. And it was weird. Like, who does that? But it was also kind of… nice. In an awkward, weird sort of way, where David might sort of maybe admit he was feeling some butterflies, but at the same time he was thinking about how incorrect it was to wipe dried blood off of an acquaintance when you weren’t a medical professional. And he was finally giving himself permission to think that maybe Patrick somehow, miraculously, _did_ like him, because why else would they be having this, this _moment_ , and David opened his mouth to say something, though he wasn’t sure yet what it was going to be — and at that exact moment the door flew open and Stevie stomped out with her foam fingers and nachos, promptly ruining whatever had just been transpiring.

They both jumped back as if they had been doing something far more scandalous than getting dry blood off of Patrick’s face — which, maybe they were, given how it felt like David’s heartbeat was in his ears — and Stevie gave them a look David couldn’t quite decipher. 

“Oh,” Patrick said, and was David imagining things, or did he seem a little… uncharacteristically flustered? “Hi, Stevie.”

“Hey,” she said, her face still doing something David couldn’t pin down. “Good sportsing.”

“Um, thanks.” Patrick cleared his throat and picked up his bag. “Well, I should let you guys get going. Thanks again for coming.” Then he turned to David with perhaps the softest smile he’d ever seen and if Stevie hadn’t been standing right there, ready to mock David ad infinitum for anything he dared let past his guard in this moment, he would’ve positively melted. “See you in class, yeah?”

“Yeah,” David said quietly. With a wave, Patrick went back into the building. 

Stevie turned to David, eyes wide and far more gleeful than David would prefer. “What was _that_?”

David shook his head and brushed past her, walking toward the parking lot. “Shut the fuck up and drive me back to the motel.”


	5. Chapter 5

After Stevie walked in on… whatever that was at the hockey game, with the blood and the touching and the standing very close to each other under the stars, there was really no point in David trying to convince her there wasn’t _something_ going on there, at least from his end. David couldn’t decide if it was better or worse than when he had plausible deniability, because although the pestering now only occurred every _other_ time Patrick came up in conversation, it was _much_ worse when it did happen. 

“Don’t be a wuss,” she said one day, mouth full of cafeteria pizza that tasted like cardboard. “Just ask him out.”

“No!” David said. “He’s not even — he’s — no.”

“A strong rebuttal,” Stevie replied. “But have you considered that maybe he _is_ even, and that yes?”

“Have you considered shutting the fuck up?”

“I did consider it, but I decided it wasn’t for me.”

“Well, could you consider it again?” 

“I mean, don’t you want to spend more time with him?” Stevie asked, clearly trying to pivot to the _good friend_ approach, but David wasn’t sure he was buying it. “If you… I don’t know, make your affections known, maybe he’d take the hint and you might spend time with him outside of flirting in class and texting about math.”

“ _Make my affections known_? What is this, a Jane Austen novel?”

“You tell me, you’re the one who’s seen every romantic comedy known to man.”

“Yeah, well, unfortunately this isn’t a romantic comedy.”

Stevie leaned in. “Ooh, _unfortunately_.”

“Stop it,” David snapped. “Look, he has his life and his friends, and I have my life and my friends—” David rolled his eyes at Stevie’s look, correcting himself, “—my _friend_ , and there’s a line that we just don’t cross. The space on the venn diagram where our lives overlap is very small, and that’s like, that’s fine.”

Stevie sighed. “I can’t believe I’m giving you genuine advice, but you could, y’know, try and make that space bigger? Go to his hockey game this week, or something.”

“I’m not going unless he invites me again.”

“You do realize you don’t need an invitation to go to a public sporting event, right? You just need this funny little piece of paper called a ticket.”

“Yes, I’m aware how ticketing works, thanks. But it’s… different with him, for some reason. And didn’t invite me to last week’s game, anyway.”

Stevie shrugged that off. “Last week’s game was away, he probably just didn’t want to ask you to drive all the way out to Elm Glen. Especially since, you know, it would actually be me doing all the driving, because _someone_ is too afraid to retake his driver’s test.”

David made a face at her. “How do you even know that last week’s game was away?”

“I’ve been talking to Jake,” she said nonchalantly.

“I’m sorry, what?” David spluttered. “That’s not fair! You’ve given me all this shit about Patrick and then you neglect to tell me that you’ve been _talking to Jake_?”

“Alright, fine,” Stevie said, sitting up straighter. “I think he’s hot, and we’ve been talking. I’m not super invested right now, but it’s something that might happen. Now would you like to come clean about the state of your feelings towards Patrick?”

David slouched down in his seat. “No.”

“Okay, great. If you want it to be fair, from now on, all information about my relationship with Jake will be shared on a one-for-one basis, and will be only shared upon your being honest about what’s going on with you and Patrick.”

“But that means that every time you tell me something, I’d have to tell _you_ something, and then because I told you something you’d have to tell me another thing, and then we’d end up in an infinite loop.”

“Oh, no, it only goes the one way. I don’t have to share a Jake thing every time you share a Patrick thing.”

“Then that’s not fair!” 

“If you made a move on Patrick, I might be willing to reconsider my terms,” Stevie said, then popped the last piece of pizza in her mouth like it was some sort of punctuation to her statement. David kicked her under the table.

* * *

When they started their unit on painting in AP Studio Art, David knew he was going to have to start using color. It’s not that he was against the use of color in art — quite the opposite, actually — but it just didn’t seem like _him_. He had a personal aesthetic to maintain, thank you very much. But they were meant to be painting a landscape, and there was only so much he could do with varying shades of gray. 

He’d been working on the project for a few days before he actually had to move into the dangerous realm of color, but as soon as the tiniest splash of it made it onto David’s palette, Patrick noticed, because of course he did. 

“ _Red_?” he asked incredulously. “I have to admit, that’s not where I expected you to go.”

David shrugged. “It’s a perfectly good color.”

“No, it is, it’s just… I don’t know. I probably should’ve expected that as soon as you incorporated color, you’d go bold.”

Coming from anyone else, David might’ve assumed this was some sort of underhanded dig, but even though he’d only known Patrick a few months, David knew that coming from him it just… wasn’t. David didn’t particularly want to dive into why he was already so secure in this knowledge when he’d spent his entire life with people using him and teaching him that he shouldn’t trust anyone, much less a sports-playing math acquaintance, so he shoved the thought away and teased, “Some of us have to extend ourselves beyond fifty shades of blue.”

“It’s a landscape, David! I have to include blue!”

“I’m not.”

“Well _some of us_ don’t have your artistic expertise.” 

“I wouldn’t call it expertise,” David downplayed, but he was smiling. “Maybe competency?”

“If you’re just competent, I’d hate to know what I am.”

David tried to keep his face as straight as possible as he said, “Trying your best.”

Patrick snorted. “Mm, wonderful. Instead of a grade in this class I should just get a note that says ‘he’s trying his best.’”

“Exactly. It’s not your fault that your best is so bad.”

“Gee, thanks, David.”

“Look, someone has to knock you down a peg _somewhere_ , Patrick. You can’t be good at everything, it’s not fair.”

“Fair enough,” he said, eyeing where David was mixing a few different shades of red that Patrick probably couldn’t tell the difference between, the poor thing. “So what’s the red gonna be?”

“River,” David said absently, still focused on his paint mixing.

For some reason, Patrick laughed. “Like, a full out river of blood?”

David glanced up, not sure what to make of his response. “Yeah.”

“That’s dark.”

David shrugged. “I don’t know, I don’t think it has to be so literal. The… _movement_ of blood I guess, the rushing, the pumping through our veins, that’s what proves we’re alive. And that’s just what a river of blood is, right? Rapids and rushing and… motion,” he trailed off, realizing very suddenly that what he just said had probably somehow sounded both incredibly pretentious and also incredibly stupid at the same time and why did he ever even speak? 

When Patrick didn’t respond right away, instead opting to just sort of… stare at him, David’s worst fears were confirmed, and he immediately started backtracking. “But I mean, probably not? That was a stupid way of thinking about it, I should probably stop pretending I know anything about—”

“No,” Patrick rushed to interrupt David’s spiral, “No, you’re right.” David looked at him warily. “I’m serious. That’s a… nice way of thinking about it. And anyway, if it’s your art, you’re the one who gets to decide what it means, right?”

“I mean, sort of,” David said. “But what it means to another person is still what it means to that person, no matter what the artist intended. No two people are going to interpret a piece of art the same way, and that’s part of the beauty of it.”

Again, Patrick just studied David for a moment, but for some reason it didn’t freak him out this time. “You’re pretty smart, David.”

David shouldn’t have been _swooning_ at someone calling him smart, he really shouldn’t. And yet here he was. Knowing he was unable to handle any level of further sincerity at that moment without breaking open and probably crying all over the art room floor with everyone watching, David pivoted in the only way he knew how: banter. “Don’t sound so surprised,” he said with a smirk. 

And then Patrick fucking Brewer had the absolute _audacity_ to look him dead in the eye and say, “I’m not,” and then nonchalantly go back to working on his shitty painting as if he didn’t just rock David’s entire fucking world. 

A few minutes later, David’s painting was still devoid of red, and he was just staring at the little furrow in Patrick’s brow, trying to untangle how the hell he’d ended up here, when Patrick said without looking up, “Wanna come to my hockey game this week? We’re playing Eagle Village, and their colors are brown and yellow, so I’m sure you’d have a fun time judging the various fashion choices of their supporters.”

Luckily for David, the introduction of a school with brown and yellow school colors was enough to snap him out of whatever mushy trance he had previously found himself in. “Dear god. And I thought green and yellow beavers were bad.”

Finally, Patrick looked up with a crooked smile that should’ve been _illegal_. “So I’ll see you there, then?”

And well, how was David supposed to say no to that?

* * *

After that, David and Stevie started going to every home game, and it was actually kind of… nice. David still didn’t understand the rules, of course, and he found the sport incredibly barbaric. But there wasn’t much to do in this town, and okay _fine_ , Patrick looked very cute in all of his hockey gear. 

In any other situation, David’s attention surely would’ve been drifting to Jake or Ted or someone else on the team by this point, but it just wasn’t. Fortunately, Stevie’s grasp on David’s past relationships was loose enough that this didn’t send up any flags for her. 

Unfortunately, Alexis’s grasp on David’s past relationships was alarmingly good for someone who had been out of the country for the better portion of them, and she had started coming to games at the beginning of December (miraculously, her thing with Ted, the proud Schitt’s Creek benchwarmer that he was, hadn’t ended yet). She’d made plenty of friends at school who she could’ve sat with, but _no_ , she wanted to needle David about Patrick, so she would spend at least half of each game sitting with him and Stevie and creating an incredibly unbalanced social dynamic. 

“So like,” she said one such evening, twirling a piece of hair around her finger, “they’re allowed to smash into each other, but they’re not allowed to punch each other, right? But what if one of them wanted to stab someone else with their stick thing?”

“That is definitely not allowed,” David said. 

Alexis turned to him and poked him in the leg. “Looks like _someone_ has been paying a lot of attention to the rules of this sport. Anything to get to spend more time with Patrick, I guess?”

David rolled his eyes. “I haven’t been paying attention to the rules. It’s just obvious that they can’t stab each other, because this isn’t fencing.”

“What _else_ are you learning just to find an excuse to spend more time with Patrick?” She leaned in, and Stevie just watched on, amused, as the conversation played out in front of her. “I mean, besides math.”

“I’m not _learning math_ for him. I need to pass the stupid class, and he’s helping me.”

“Okay, but just saying, even when you were hooking up with Gian, you were _not_ this invested in math. You weren’t even this invested in Gian, and you like, really had the hots for him.”

“Shut up,” David retorted eloquently. 

At this moment, Stevie very rudely decided to inject herself into the conversation. “Wait, so this isn’t normal for him? Because he led me to believe that getting way too invested in people that he could never have happens often for him.”

“Oh, it does, but only for like, three weeks, and then he picks someone else to be obsessed with. And he would _never_ go to a hockey game for them. Like, he wasn’t even willing to visit juvie for Toni, and he like, _really_ liked her.”

Stevie looked between them, confused. “And a hockey game is… worse than juvie?”

“Obviously. So like, the fact that he’s been following Patrick around to his hockey games like a lost puppy for well over a month now is like, really telling.” She then tried to boop David on the nose, which was frankly the last straw. 

“Okay, you’re _also_ at a hockey game because of a guy,” David interjected as he dodged her greasy little finger. 

“Yeah, but when Andrew was in prison, I _did_ visit him. Also, I consider dating a sports person to be a very cute look for me. Like, have you even seen that one scene in _A Cinderella Stor_ y?”

“Why would I _want_ to kiss someone in the rain? I’m wearing cashmere right now, it would ruin my sweater.”

Stevie shook her head, jumping in. “You made me listen to your hour-long rant about the final scene in _Bridget Jones’s Diary_ last week! You cannot convince me that you wouldn’t kill for a rom-com kiss in the rain.”

“Okay, that kiss in _Bridget Jones’s Diary_ is not in the rain, it is a tasteful, _light_ flurry of snow. Very different.”

“Just think,” Stevie said with a faux-brightness that David knew was dangerous, “the stuff that gets scraped off the ice when the players stop really fast is basically snow. Maybe you could have a kiss in a tasteful, light flurry of snow after all, if only you’d make a fucking move.”

“You, of all people, cannot give me shit for not making a move.”

“Oh, can’t I? Because as I recall, I had a very rom-com-esque makeout session with Jake behind the bleachers just two days ago.”

David’s eyebrows shot up into his hairline. “What???”

“Oooh, nice pull,” Alexis said, putting her hand up for a high five. 

Stevie eyed her hand. “I’m not doing that.” Unbothered by this, Alexis just shrugged and high fived herself as Stevie said, “Yeah, I would’ve told you, but you keep refusing to tell me things about Patrick, so per the terms of our agreement, I was unable to disclose that information. But because I told you, you now owe me some tea on Patrick.”

“You literally told me that wasn’t how it worked, Stevie.”

“Well, I make the rules.”

“Yeah,” Alexis said, “she makes the rules, and I, for one, think this is a very good rule.”

“Okay, remember when I told you to shut up?” David asked, waving his hand in Alexis’s face. “Do that again, and watch the stupid game.”

“You know, you never told _me_ to shut up,” Stevie said, the smartass.

“Shut up, Stevie.”

* * *

By some miracle, up until this point Stevie and Alexis had both stayed out of David’s hair when he inevitably ended up outside after each game, leaning against the building and talking to Patrick. Or at least, they stayed out of his hair until they got bored and wanted to go home. Today, however, Alexis decided to make herself a nuisance in every way possible, and she sauntered up to Patrick approximately thirty seconds after he came outside. 

“I noticed Rachel wasn’t at the game tonight,” she said, as if that was a perfectly normal and nonchalant way to start a conversation. 

“Uh, no,” Patrick said with an awkward smile, “she’s sick, actually.”

David was glaring daggers at Alexis, but they clearly had no effect on her. “Aww, that’s too bad! Are you gonna like, go bring her soup or something really cute and chivalrous?”

Patrick eyed Alexis like he didn’t know what to do with her. Which, fair. “I wasn’t planning on it? But now I’m feeling like… maybe I should?”

“Well, it would really depend on what the state of your relationship is, you know?” Alexis continued, completely ignoring David’s increasingly aggressive faces. “Because I’ve actually been talking to her, and I think it would mean a lot to her if you did that, but you also like, don’t wanna lead her on.”

“When have you been talking to Rachel?” David asked in the most casual accusatory tone he could muster, but all Alexis did was give him an extremely conspicuous wink-that’s-really-just-a-forceful-blink. 

“So if you’re still into her, you should maybe go do that, but if you, I don’t know, have your eye on someone else or something, you probably shouldn’t. Or you should at least tell her where you stand, because honestly I think she’s kind of confused?”

“Oh. Okay. Um, thanks for the advice,” Patrick said vaguely.

“You’re so welcome,” she said booping Patrick on the nose, and then sauntered away just as quickly as she came, dragging David with her. All David could do was grimace back at Patrick and give an awkward wave before he was out of sight.

Thankfully, Alexis kept her big mouth shut on the way home, but as soon as Stevie dropped them off and they shut the motel door behind them, Alexis said, “I am picking up _so many_ vibes, David. Like, so many.”

Knowing it was no use to play dumb regarding the topic of said statement, David just glared at her as he took off his shoes and said, “There are no vibes. Trust me.”

“Alright, fine,” Alexis said. “If there really aren’t any vibes, then you’ll be totally fine coming to the party at Mutt’s house after the game next week.”

“I am absolutely not attending a party at my history teacher’s house full of a bunch of people I don’t actually like just to get some shitty booze. I can drink shitty booze in the safety of my own creepy motel room, thanks.”

“Come _on,_ David, it’ll be so fun! Everyone will be celebrating the beginning of winter break, wearing those cute little Santa sweaters and everything!”

“Ew.”

“Paaaatrick will be there.”

“I’m not going,” he said, chucking a pillow in her general direction. 

* * *

He went to the party. It was 30% Stevie not being free that night, 50% concern about Alexis’s safety and wellbeing, 5% Alexis’s stupid pleading eyes, and yes, 15% knowing that Patrick would be there that got him to go, but regardless, he was there.

And to no one’s surprise, least of all his own, he was having a shit time. 

Alexis had abandoned him almost immediately upon arrival to go hang out with Ted, and with Stevie not present, David had literally no one to talk to. As a result, he found himself walking the perimeter of each room, looking at the family pictures scattered around the house. One photo was particularly haunting, and David wondered if Mrs. Schitt had paid extra to make her eyes follow you, like his mom always did for their family portraits. 

Eventually, though, he ran out of family photos to hover around, and the noise generated by drunk, rowdy teenagers was getting a bit much for him, so he filled his cup with shitty beer from the keg in the kitchen and wandered outside, posting himself up at the side of the house, where just enough light from the porch lights bled out into the area for him to _not_ look like a backlit horror movie serial killer to any innocent passers-by. 

It was snowing, just a little — the kind of light flurries that would make for a perfect rom-com kiss, some unhelpful voice in the back of his brain pointed out — and he could see his breath in the cold air. He spent a few minutes trying to see if he could make shapes with his breath like he could with smoke (he couldn’t, unfortunately), before giving in and taking to scrolling Instagram. 

He was somewhere deep down a soap-cutting video rabbithole when he heard a familiar voice ask, “What are you doing out here?”

David’s head snapped up and he was greeted by the sight of Patrick standing only a few feet in front of him. He was just wearing a long-sleeve shirt and shivering and little bit, and David was suddenly, annoyingly, reminded of the homecoming game, the first time Patrick had first acknowledged him outside of class. 

“Well,” David said, since he figured he should probably answer eventually, “Alexis dragged me here and I don’t have any friends in there, so.” He gestured vaguely at his current predicament of leaning against the brick like a loitering youth — which, well, he kind of was. 

“You have me,” Patrick said, not missing a beat. 

David studied him. What he wanted to say, really, was to ask Patrick if he _actually_ had him, because they never talked to each other with other people around, and it was kind of clear that neither of them actually felt comfortable crossing that line. But instead, he just shrugged and said, “I figured you’d be busy shotgunning cheap beer with the rest of the hockey team, celebrating another win.”

Patrick smiled, and David very suddenly got the intense impulse to do whatever he had to do to keep that smile on his face. “Nah, I’ve just got water,” he said, holding his stereotypical red solo cup (ugh, middle America was so tacky), “I’m DD tonight.”

“Ah,” David nodded, “responsible.”

“Just pulled the short straw this week.”

“You what?”

“Pulled the short straw? You’ve never heard that?” David shook his head, and Patrick laughed. “Same idea as the short end of the stick metaphor. Like, when you have to do something you don’t want to.”

“Mm, see that’s where we’re different. Rich people don’t ever have to do things they don’t want to do.”

Patrick crossed his arms, actively trying to hide his smile this time. “Ah, and how’s that been going for you recently?”

“Horribly, thanks so much for asking.” David took a sip of his beer that tasted like hot trash and they stood in comfortable silence for a moment before he said, “You’d do it anyway, though.”

“What?” Patrick asked.

“Be DD. If everyone else refused. You’d do it anyway, or you’d like, spend all your money to call an Uber all the way from Elmdale or something, because you’re a nice person or whatever.” He could’ve left it there. He _should’ve_. But there was something about the night or the beer or the dumb doe eyes Patrick was always giving him that made him add, “Whereas I’m the kind of person who spent seventeen years paying people to write my papers for me.”

“Yeah, but would you still do that?” Patrick asked, obviously expecting a no, but David just scoffed. 

“If I had the money? Absolutely.”

Patrick took a step closer and leaned against the wall, and dear god, _now_ David was reminded of that first night outside the ice rink, where he got the rug pulled out from under him because of a stupid fleck of blood. “I don’t know if I believe that,” Patrick said. 

David raised an eyebrow. “Pray tell.”

“I mean, I didn’t know you before. But I don’t think you’re necessarily the same person that you were then. I mean, look at you now. Drinking Natty Light at a house party with a bunch of farmkids.”

“Rich kid parties are basically the same, just with a full bar, a penthouse view, and a lot more E.”

“Sounds pretty different to me.”

“Yeah, but people suck in both places, so.” David chugged the rest of his beverage (apparently called Natty Light, which was a revolting name) and started systematically cracking the plastic on the lip of his cup just to give his hands something to do. 

Patrick didn’t say anything until David finally looked up at him, and then he said, with more sincerity than David was equipped to handle at this juncture, “You’re a good person, David.”

David paused. “ _Good_ is not the same as _nice_ , though.”

“No. But I think you could get there,” Patrick said, in the tone that only he could pull off that was somehow both teasing and earnest. 

“That’s very optimistic of you.”

“Oh, it would take a _lot_ of effort,” Patrick continued, and David looked away, biting the inside of his lip to keep from smiling. “But luckily for you, I do set an incredible example. After all, I won ‘nicest junior’ for last year’s class superlatives.’”

“Mm. Well my school also did superlatives last year, and I won ‘most likely to contract an STI’, so,” David said, now grabbing the cracked bits of his cup and pulling down, ripping it into little strips. “Which is like, so off-base, because obviously I am _very_ safe, but I think Sebastien was just pissed that I made him use a condom, so he started a whisper campaign that I gave him gonorrhea,” he added, because he had no brain-to-mouth filter and for some reason being around Patrick made him admit shit like this. 

Patrick’s ears reddened a bit at the topic change, but he weathered on. “Sebastien sounds like a dick.”

“You have no idea.”

They stood there in silence for a moment, and Patrick was just _looking_ at David, and David was just anxiously ripping up his cup.

“I’m really glad you’re here, David,” Patrick finally said, and he needed to _stop_ with the sincerity, because soon David’s cup was going to be in shreds and then what would he do to distract himself from looking at Patrick’s little puppy eyes?

“That makes one of us,” David said instead.

Even without looking at him, David could just _feel_ the challenging look Patrick was giving him. “You’d _really_ rather be going to school with people like Sebastien than with people like me?”

David finally looked up and was greeted by a smirk that was somehow also sweet, which shouldn’t have been possible. “Well, when you put it like _that,_ ” he said, and Patrick’s smirk grew into a fully-formed, toothy smile, which was maybe the most beautiful thing David had ever seen. A rogue snowflake landed on Patrick’s cheek, and holy FUCK since when were they standing so close together?

Upon realizing this, David, the fool that he was, couldn’t help but glance down at Patrick’s lips, and he knew as soon as he did it that it was over. Patrick would notice, of course, and he would think it was weird because of course he wasn’t into David like that, because even if he _was_ queer why would he like _David_ of all people, and then Patrick would run away and ask to change seats in art, and just like that David would lose 50% of his friends in this town. 

But miraculously, Patrick didn’t do that. And either David was losing his mind, or Patrick looked at _his_ lips too. And then David was leaning in, or maybe Patrick was leaning in, or hell, maybe they both were, and before David really had the chance to process what was happening, they were kissing. 

It was heaven. 

David had kissed a lot of people before, people who were excellent kissers and dirty kissers and downright _filthy_ kissers, but nothing in his life had prepared him for what it would feel like to kiss Patrick Brewer. It was a chaste kiss, too, it wasn’t even — and yet, David’s heart was trying to claw its way out of his chest. 

David dropped his cup, and the slight clatter it made upon hitting the ground was lost in the rushing in his ears and the pounding of his pulse and the fact that the only thing that his senses could take in right now was _Patrick Patrick Patrick_. He brought a hand up to cup Patrick’s cheek, his skin was surprisingly soft for someone who most assuredly didn’t moisturize, and dear god, David could _die—_

And _that_ was when Patrick ran. 

David touching his face must’ve pulled him out of whatever hypnosis he’d been in, because Patrick jerked back, looking rather panicked, no doubt because he was _not_ into David and this whole thing had been one big, friendship-ruining mistake. And then Patrick took a step back and mumbled something incoherent, and before David could get a word or an apology or an excuse in edgewise, he was gone. 

And so, less than thirty seconds after he was first injected with the euphoria that was kissing Patrick Brewer, David was abruptly left with nothing but his critically wounded dignity and a destroyed cup, splayed out on the ground below him like a red plastic octopus, slowly being buried by snow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I have seen neither A Cinderella Story nor Bridget Jones's Diary. Feel free to roast me in the comments.


	6. Chapter 6

The next morning, David woke up with a pounding headache that he was fairly certain had nothing to do with what he had drunk the night before. Alexis, of course, was up early, flitting around the room as she got ready, blabbing on and on about how now that it was finally break, Ted was going to take her on some… something, somewhere — frankly, David was trying his best to not pay attention. Unfortunately, however, so far his attempts to suffocate himself with his pillow had failed. 

He felt a poke on his leg. “David,” Alexis whined, “what is wrong with you? Stop hiding under there like a burrowing weasel.”

“I’m not a weasel,” David said, his voice coming out muffled through all the fabric he had buried himself under. “And it’s way too early to be up. What is it, seven am?”

“Um, it’s _9:30_ ,” Alexis huffed, as if that wasn’t still ungodly early, especially here, on a weekend, on the first day of winter break. 

“Too early.”

“Well, Stevie’s bored out of her mind in the office, and I’m sure a recap of the party last night would cheer her up immensely.”

“Shut the fuck up,” David snapped, but it was ruined a bit by the fact that his mouth was full of pillow. 

“Jeez, David,” Alexis said, “what’s got your panties in such a twist? Did something happen last night?”

It’s not that David hadn’t thought about telling Alexis last night. He had. It would’ve been a fantastic excuse to get her to leave the party early with him, and that would’ve been far preferable to the rest of the night he spent hiding out in various questionable locales at the Schitt house where Patrick — or anyone, really — would never think to look for him, and chugging more shitty beer. (Okay, maybe the headache was _partially_ a hangover.)

But Alexis had also been kind of drunk, and she was having a good time, and her pity was probably going to be way worse than her teasing, so David had just kept his mouth shut. Which he continued to do now, opting to ignore his sister’s statement completely. “Just shut the curtains when you leave.”

“Ugh, fine, be that way,” she grumbled. “You stay in your little — your dark little _witch’s house_ in here, and I’ll go have a great and wonderful time eating candy canes and drinking hot chocolate with Ted.”

“Cool, fuck you,” he replied as the door slammed shut behind her, the curtains still open, because she was nothing if not a petty nuisance. David just burrowed deeper into his bed and drifted off into an uneasy sleep. 

He was awoken a few hours later by a loud banging on his door, and, when he ignored it, he heard the clumsy turning of a key in the lock. At this point, David was fairly certain that it was an axe murderer, and he was resigned to his fate, so he just stayed in bed. When the door swung open, however, he did not find a Jack Nicholson-type, but rather, a haggard-looking Stevie who promptly threatened to throw snowballs at him in his bed if he didn’t get up. 

This was how, about thirty minutes and a very rushed skincare routine later, David found himself sitting next to Stevie on the couch in the office, hiding his face in his hands and explaining what had happened the night prior. 

“So now I’ve made it weird because I couldn’t keep myself from kissing him for ONE NIGHT, and now our… friendship, acquaintanceship, whatever the fuck it was, is over,” David concluded. 

“Based on your retelling, it seems like you both kind of kissed each other, though,” Stevie said. 

“Did you miss the part where he literally _ran away_?”

“Okay, that’s not great. _But_ ,” she said, preempting David’s attempt to interrupt her, “all you know is that he freaked out and ran. You don’t know _why_ he did that.”

David scoffed. “I think it’s pretty obvious.”

“It’s not, though. I mean, what if he’s just having a run-of-the-mill sexuality crisis?”

“He avoided me for the rest of the night, Stevie.”

“No, you avoided _him_. I’m sure he’ll text you sometime in the next couple days, like he always does.”

“He definitely won’t, because I definitely royally fucked this up,” David argued. 

“Then _you_ text him.”

“Absolutely not. I will not be walking into that humiliation.”

Stevie shrugged, getting up and heading back to the front desk to play solitaire or stalk Twitter or whatever she did up there. “Suit yourself. If you want to ruin your winter break because you’re a fucking dipshit, that’s on you.”

* * *

By Christmas Eve, David was losing his mind. 

First and foremost, Patrick hadn’t texted. And David, of course, hadn’t initiated any texting, because he didn’t have a death wish. With his silence and also the fact that he _literally ran away_ as soon as David kissed him, Patrick had made it clear that whatever David might have thought was between them had been a figment of his imagination all along. 

Secondly, he was correct in guessing that Alexis’s pity would be worse than her teasing. She had found out about the Patrick debacle not long after Stevie had, and in a misguided attempt to spare David or something (attempted kindness was not usually her style when it came to him, so David wasn’t positive), kept trailing off partway through stories about her escapades with Ted, which was frankly worse than if she’d just told the stories in full. 

Lastly, David was hopelessly alone. His parents were out to dinner without him at a place in Elmdale that was as fancy as they could afford on their meager Schitt’s Creek budget. They didn’t realize until just before they left that they literally had a child who was alone on Christmas whom they might have considered when planning for the night, but his mother informed him with “sincerest regrets to my firstborn son” that they had made a two-person reservation that they could not change, so he ought to find something else to do tonight. 

Alexis, on the other hand, had been invited to some family gathering by Twyla, which was apparently taking place at the Elm County Community Center, because there were so many extended Sands relatives that they all simply couldn’t fit in any one person’s house. Stevie had been dragged to some event with a bunch of old people at her aunt’s house, so although she assured David she was having a miserable time, she was still at least _somewhere_.

And Patrick. David didn’t know for sure what Patrick was doing, but he was probably at some warm family dinner, surrounded by loving parents and cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents, with homemade food and everything that David didn’t have. Maybe he’d invited Rachel, David thought sourly, just for old time’s sake. 

Up until this point, David had never actually put a ton of stock into Christmas — between the fact that he was only Christian on his mom’s side and they didn’t spend much time with her family anyway, and the fact that when you’re rich any day can be Christmas, there was nothing particularly special to him about the holiday. Sure, his family had their extravagant party every Christmas Eve, which was nice, he supposed, but not wildly different from any other crazy party they threw or attended. 

And yet, here he was, absolutely miserable on Christmas Eve. 

He wandered into his parents’ room to look at the sad, glued together Christmas tree his dad had insisted on getting, hoping it might imbue him with some Christmas cheer, but it actually just made him feel worse. The poor thing was the real-life incarnation of a Charlie Brown tree (and he should know — he once played Lucy in his elite, invitation-only daycare’s adaptation of _A Charlie Brown Christmas_ ).

Dragging himself back into his own sad living quarters, David eyed the bottle of wine that lay stuffed under his bed. He and Stevie had stolen it from Brebner’s (read: Stevie had stolen it, he didn’t have Stevie’s ability to go incognito or Alexis’s finely-honed klepto skills) with the intention of getting schwasty on it sometime between Christmas and New Year’s, but as it started to snow serenely outside (perfect for a rom-com kiss, and a stark reminder of the last one that went awry) and David found himself still hopelessly lonely, it was looking more and more tempting. Collapsing onto his bed, he shot Stevie a text. If she didn’t answer in, say… ten minutes, he was going to drink that wine and there was nothing she could do to stop him. 

Nine minutes and zero incoming text messages later, David said “fuck it” and popped the motherfucker open. 

About an hour after that, David had downed most of the bottle and was feeling… a bit wobbly, to say the least. Fuzzy. Wavy? Could people feel wavy? Because David was pretty sure he did. 

He glanced at the clock and realized that it wasn’t actually that late — between the drive and his mother’s snail-like eating pace, his parents were probably still on appetizers, and who knew if Alexis was ever going to make it out of the black hole that was Twyla’s family. He could do whatever he wanted for the next little while, uninterrupted, so he considered his options.

He could sext his long list of exes just to see who would bite (metaphorically — he already knew which ones were biters). He could reorganize his knits for the third time that week. He could relearn the choreography of Single Ladies, which he at one point knew but had unfortunately forgotten. He could break into the office, turn off the wifi, and play the little dinosaur video game that comes up when Chrome can’t connect to the internet. 

Or, he could do the pointless math homework that Mrs. Gunnarsson had assigned over break because “you have to keep those pre-calc neurons firing, kids!” But doing that would probably involve getting confused, and then he would want to text Patrick, which he couldn’t do now because he had been a starry-eyed fool, and dammit, now he couldn’t stop thinking about texting Patrick.

He really did try to lead his drunken brain elsewhere — even going so far as turning on the TV and trying to see if there was a palatable Christmas movie playing, or at least a shitty Hallmark one that he would claim to hate but then inevitably cry over — but once he thought of texting Patrick, he couldn’t get it to leave the front of his mind. Like, was it a bad idea? Absolutely. But David had most assuredly done stupider things in lesser states of desperation. And he was still feeling wavy, and it maybe didn’t sound as bad of an idea as it had seemed when he was not wavy. And being wavy was _funner_ than being not wavy, so he really trusted his wavy self more. Also, none of the Christmas movies on TV were really speaking to him, so what else was he supposed to do?

David spent a good ten minutes trying to craft the perfect message, only to end up sending perhaps the worst text he had ever written: “hey”. He regretted it instantly. What the hell was Patrick supposed to say to that, even if he by some miracle _wanted_ to answer? There was no call to action! No built-in discussion topic! Not even a stupid emoji to imply tone! He just sounded like the kind of horny douchebag who messages random girls on Instagram to try to get laid. 

David chose to deal gracefully with this considerable misstep by chucking his phone across the room. Which, in hindsight, was not a particularly good idea given that he had no real means of replacing it at this time if it broke, but his wavy brain had thought it was a good idea in the moment, so. Although, to be fair, his wavy brain had also thought “hey” would be a good text to send to Patrick after a disastrous kiss and a week of silence, so maybe he shouldn’t actually trust wavy-brained David all that much. 

And so wavy-brained David was back to laying face-down on his bed, wallowing in self-pity and general Grinchiness, when about five minutes later, he heard his phone buzz from its place on the floor. 

David bolted up, staring at it. It only buzzed the once, which meant it probably wasn’t Stevie, who had a serial tendency to double text, and it definitely wasn’t Alexis, who used the ‘send’ button almost as often as she used the space bar. It wasn’t his dad, because he couldn’t text for the life of him, and although Moira could, she was far more inclined to go for a classic phone call. 

Which meant it had to be Patrick. 

Sure, there were about a thousand other contacts saved in David’s phone, but if none of them had texted him in the past five months, why would they bother to start now? Rich people wouldn’t give a fuck about wishing him a Merry Christmas when instead they could be tracking down some good E that David could no longer supply. 

Slowly, carefully, in the least wobbly manner possible (not easy), David got up from the bed and made his way over to his phone, which was facedown on the floor near the door to his parents’ room. He stared at the phone for a moment before downing the last swig of his wine and reaching down for the phone, figuring it was best to just rip the band-aid off.

He had exactly two thoughts when he turned it over to look at the screen. The first was _ohthankgoditdidn’tcrack._ The second was just _FUCK._

Because the text was, in fact, from Patrick, and it said a simple “Hello.”

Deciding it best to stop overthinking now that he’d already dug himself into this hole, David sent off the next few texts rapidfire. 

**i;m sorry i just saud hey**

**hats a rly bad conversation starter**

**full discolsure i am a little drunk**

_Seems like you’re more than a little drunk, David._

**shhhhhhhhjhhh let me live in blissful denial**

**im wavy**

**are u wavy ?**

_I have no idea what that means._

**are u drinkin**

**do u have one of those cool families thats like “wed rather u do it safe with us than unsafe out on the s treets”**

**i bet u do**

_My parents have been known to allow me to have some spiked eggnog every so often on Christmas, yes._

**that didnt ansawe rmy question about wavy**

**ansawer**

**ansere**

**u get it**

_I feel like “wavy” would be more of a high thing than a drunk thing, though. Are you sure you’re not actually high?_

**yes i an quite sure**

**respect my process** ****

**i dont appreciate ur sass good sir**

_No, David, I wouldn’t say I’m wavy. Perhaps just a slight ripple._

Well, that was too bad, David thought, because despite the emotional rollercoaster it had taken him on, he was presently quite enjoying his waviness. Especially since Patrick, after a week of silence and general weirdness, was now just answering his texts in a normal, characteristically snarky way. To be fair, David had no fucking idea what to do with this turn of events. But at least for the time being, he was enjoying it. Non-wavy David could deal with everything else later, he decided, and so he flopped back down on his bed and texted Patrick back again. 

Around one am, David was startled awake, face smushed into his pillow and phone still in his hand, to the dulcet tones of Alexis loudly stomping her snowy boots on the doormat. 

“Please, be a little louder,” David grumbled. 

“Merry Christmas to you, too, David,” she replied. “How did you go from witch’s house to sleeping with all the lights on?”

If the boot-stomping hadn’t woken him up enough, that question certainly did, as the events of the night crashed down on him like a snowbank crashing down on a… something. Did snowbanks crash? Okay, he was still a little drunk. 

In lieu of a response to his sister, David snatched up his phone and scanned his messages. The last several were from Patrick, received just before midnight. 

_Ha, I don’t believe that._

_David? You still there?_

_I’m going to assume you fell asleep._

_ Drink a ton of water in the morning, please. I get the feeling that you’re really gonna be feeling this one. _

Then, after sending nothing for a few minutes, Patrick sent one more text at 12:01.

_Merry Christmas, David._

David turned so Alexis couldn’t see the smile that he couldn’t have bitten down if he tried. He read the messages again, then once more, just for good measure. Then he plugged his phone in and curled up under the covers, skincare routine be damned.

Merry Christmas, indeed. 

* * *

For the following week, David and Patrick texted about every day. Sometimes David texted first, sometimes Patrick did, but they talked about holidays and family and school and (unfortunately for David) hockey and it felt… normal. 

Except. 

Neither one of them had actually addressed the fact that two weeks prior, they’d kissed and then Patrick had made a run for it. 

It’s not that David didn’t _want_ to bring it up. No, actually, it _was_ that he didn’t want to bring it up, because things were feeling so good and normal and he didn’t want to make things weird again. But also, he kind of felt like he _needed_ to. He needed closure, at least, on what all that was. He needed an answer one way or another. All he had to do was bring it up.

Of course, he did not do that. And of course, Stevie told him (loudly, every day) he was an idiot for not doing it. 

“You’re just making it harder on yourself for when it finally does come up,” she said one day, sitting on the couch in the motel office and tossing M&Ms in her mouth. 

“Or I’m just avoiding having to deal with it ever.”

“Very healthy.”

“I’ve never claimed to have healthy coping mechanisms,” David said, stealing a handful of her candy and shoving it in his mouth because he deserved it, goddammit. “But like, it’s fine.”

Stevie yanked her M&Ms away and crossed her arms in a way that meant that David was not going to like whatever she was about to say. “If it’s so fine, I guess you’ll be fine with seeing him when you come with me to Mutt’s New Year’s party?” 

“That is literally the exact same thing Alexis told me when she dragged me to Mutt’s party that started all of this, so a) very eerie that you said the same thing, have you been conspiring, and b) it is for that reason that I am absolutely not going. Why do you even want to go?” he asked, because really, that was the most suspicious thing here. 

Stevie looked at him like he was crazy. “Free booze. Free snacks. Apparently last year Mutt convinced Mrs. Schitt to make a bunch of pigs in a blanket before she and Roland left for the night to go to their weird Mayors of Elm County event.”

David wasn’t buying it. “And?”

Stevie shrugged. “Jake asked if I was coming, and I said I would. I don’t particularly want to show up alone.”

“Then bring Alexis.”

“No. And she’s getting there early to help set up anyway.”

David couldn’t help but laugh at that. “She’s going to _help set up_?”

“Yeah, Twyla was talking about it yesterday at the cafe.”

“Oh my god,” David said, genuinely shocked at this turn of events. “What has this town done to her?”

“Made her nicer, apparently. What has this town done to _you_ ?” Stevie asked, poking him in the leg in a way that invoked Alexis and was clearly strategically placed just to piss him off. “Or perhaps more important, what has _Patrick_ done to you?”

Stevie made a very obnoxious heart shape with her hands, and so David responded with a deadpan, “Improved my math grade.” Then he added, for good measure, “I’m not going to the party.”

“What, do you want to spend another holiday alone in your sad little motel room, except even worse because you’ll be sober?”

“Who’s saying I’ll be sober?”

“Given that I am both your alcohol and your drug dealer, me. Me is saying you’ll be sober.”

David sighed. “I hate you so much.”

At that, Stevie just grinned. “Find your sparkliest sweater, David, because we’re going to a New Year’s party.”


	7. A Stevie Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Several of you said you were looking forward to the New Year’s Party, so, uhhh……. buckle up and keep your arms and legs inside the ride at all times, kids.

Stevie was successful in dragging David to the party, obviously. At this point, she was well-versed in the finer points of Dealing With David Rose, so she absolutely expected him to cave to her practiced _I’m-your-only-friend_ wiles. What she didn’t expect was for him to actually have a sweater that was somehow both sparkly and tasteful, but she should’ve known by now that he would never disappoint when it came to fashion. (After all, his wardrobe had also supplied her an impeccable bomber jacket for the night.)

To be quite honest, she wasn’t sure how the night was going to go. David was definitely going to spiral at some point, and she had absolutely no means of predicting what Patrick was going to do, but she was sick of David being willfully ignorant of his own problems and she had to do something. Also, she really wanted the free booze and pigs in a blanket. 

By the time they got there, it was after 10:30 and the party was already in full swing, because she and David were nothing if not habitually fashionably late. 

She, of course, made a beeline to the pigs in a blanket, and it’s not like David was going to say no to food, so they found themselves in the kitchen. They had a pretty good vantage point from there to observe the beer pong game occurring in the dining room, where Patrick and Rachel were absolutely _crushing_ Morgan Currie and some dude Stevie recognized from the class below them but whose name she never bothered to learn. 

It seemed that Rachel, however, celebrating her freedom from her previous ailment, did not need to use beer pong as an excuse to drink — Stevie watched as she paused before her turn to take a shot, downing it like a pro. Laughing as he took the empty shot glass from her, Patrick turned to set it down on a table behind them, and in doing so, happened to glance in the general direction of the kitchen. 

Stevie could pinpoint the exact moment he spotted David — although Patrick schooled his expression quickly, Stevie was not so unaware as to not notice the mix of surprise and elation on his face in the meantime. Ultimately, he just quirked an eyebrow at David that seemed to say something that Stevie couldn’t understand, and David raised an eyebrow in return before Rachel stole Patrick’s attention away, tapping him on the shoulder and indicating that it was his turn in the game.

Stevie turned back to David to find him hiding his face in his drink. God, these two were both such idiots. 

“So, you gonna actually address things tonight, or at least make out with him or someth—” Stevie was cut off by David smacking his hand over her mouth and giving her a death glare. 

“Watch your mouth,” he hissed, looking around, and Stevie took this time to lick his hand. He jumped back with a very Alexis-like “ _EW,”_ and Stevie smiled triumphantly. 

“I’m just saying,” she said, a little quieter this time, “New Year’s is a great excuse to have a repeat kiss.”

“It’s also a great excuse for me to murder you and make it look like it was just a drunk driving accident.”

“Aw, thanks, but then you wouldn’t have any friends!”

Stevie had clearly intended this as a joke, a gentle negging, if you will, but because David was a dark disaster of a person, and because his mind was hyperfixated on Patrick literally 100% of the time, he said, “Yeah, because it’s not like Patrick would talk to me in such an open forum of his friends.”

“What happened to ‘ _everything is good, I don’t want to address any of my problems, let’s not ruin the perfect bubble of Patrick I’m in_ ’?”

“Well, that was before you dragged me to this fucking place.” Okay, so she was going to be dealing with pessimistic David tonight. She could deal with that. 

Probably. 

* * *

As a matter of fact, Stevie was quite ill-prepared to deal with that. She’d dealt with pessimistic David with success before, of course, but she’d underestimated the negative impacts the party environment would have on him. And now it was 11:30, and she’d only been able to talk to Jake for like five minutes and they hadn’t even made out, and she was spending so much time David-wrangling that she barely had time to finish a single drink. Alexis was useless, too busy doing whatever the fuck she was doing over there with Ted, Twyla, and the karaoke machine. And Patrick — well, Patrick probably would’ve been useful, but that would require him to actually interact with David in a meaningful way at all. 

Stevie had given Patrick the benefit of the doubt for a while there — he was clearly in the middle of a very heated game of beer pong, it’s not like he was going to up and leave to talk to David in the middle of the game. But then the game ended and he moved onto talking to other people, and dancing with his other friends, and generally not looking in their direction, and Stevie started to worry that dragging David here had been a horrible, horrible idea after all. 

And when Patrick hardly glanced at David when he came into the kitchen with one of his student council friends to get a refill — well, that was the last straw for David, so now Stevie was stuck sitting next to him on the stairs, listening to him spiral and not being sure what to say to make him feel better that wasn’t an outright lie. 

“This is just how it’s going to be,” David said for the fifth time in the past 15 minutes, “and that’s fine. That’s FINE. Our, our… friendship, or whatever, will just be Patrick’s dirty little secret and that’s FINE. I’ve been here before, everything is FINE.”

It could not be more clearly _not fine_. But Stevie had not prepared herself sufficiently for the hell she had brought upon herself that night, and all she could think to do was to listen to him rant and keep feeding him Cheetos, so that’s what she did. He started losing steam around 11:45, thank god, and once he wore himself out, they just sat there for a little while, watching the partiers. Alexis had acquired a feather boa at some point, so her attempts to rope various jocks into wearing it were a good source of entertainment for a while (and Mutt looked great). 

Soon, though, people started congregating around the TV in preparation to watch the ball drop, and from their perch on the stairs, Stevie and David had a good vantage point on basically everyone — which meant they had a nice, clear view of a very drunk Rachel hanging all over Patrick, who was very much not stopping her. At this point, David started getting fidgety, so Stevie dealt with the situation the only way she knew how: distraction.

“So do people really like, wear diapers and shit to Times Square just so they can wait twelve hours to watch the ball drop?”

David scoffed. “Only fucking tourists do. I once watched it from Paris Hilton’s ex-bodyguard’s penthouse that was right over Times Square, and it was incredibly anticlimactic. I much preferred the time we watched the fireworks in Sydney from Stephen Sondheim’s brother’s yacht.”

Stevie was _very_ tempted to tell him how much he sounded like Alexis in this moment, but given that she valued her life, she kept her mouth shut. Unfortunately, Rachel and Patrick did not seem to have any regard for her life and the wrath David was going to bring upon her for bringing him here, because at that moment Rachel latched herself onto Patrick, arms around his waist. She yelled something way too close to his ear, although from their distance Stevie couldn’t make it out, and Patrick laughed in a way that genuinely made Stevie wonder if he _was_ still into Rachel after all.

And when Patrick brushed a piece of hair out of Rachel’s face, that was when David snapped. 

“Okay,” he said, abruptly standing up, eyes still on the hordes of people in front of the TV, “I’m done. I’m walking home.”

Stevie stared at him in disbelief. “You’re… walking home?”

“Yeah,” David replied, as if this was a normal thing for him to say and not the craziest thing that had ever come out of his mouth. He started climbing down the stairs, very intentionally not looking Stevie in the eye. 

“It’s the middle of the night, it’s _freezing,_ and you live like two miles away.”

“And?”

“You once yelled at me for parking too far away from your door at the motel! You’re gonna walk two miles home?”

At the bottom of the stairs, David finally turned and looked at Stevie. Startlingly, his face was basically devoid of emotion. “Yes.” At that, he turned on his heel and walked out of the house. 

At this juncture, Stevie found herself in a major conundrum. She could go after David in an attempt to be a good friend or whatever, knowing that there was about a 50-50 chance that she would actually just piss him off and make matters worse, given that she was the one who dragged David here to begin with. Or, she could stay here, hook up with Jake, and let David stew on his own, which _could_ help give him the space to work things out and calm the fuck down, or it could lead to him spiralling even worse than he had with her tonight.

She was still weighing those two terrible options when the countdown started, and there was a highly unnecessary amount of screaming and disorder as the room joined in. When the clock struck midnight, Stevie watched as various couples started eating each others’ faces, and the single folk blew on their noisemakers and threw confetti. 

In the middle of the crowd, Rachel hooked her arms around Patrick’s neck and reached up, very clearly going in for a kiss, and — Patrick gently but firmly pushed her away. 

Huh. 

Stevie started thinking that maybe she should stay just to parse out what the fuck Patrick thought he was doing, but at that very moment, Jake materialized out of nowhere, yanked her down from the stairs, and swooped in for a New Year’s kiss — and, well, she lost track of pretty much anything else for awhile. 

* * *

A little after one am, Stevie wandered outside with a joint she’d bummed off of her cousin, wondering if now that she’d successfully hooked up with Jake, maybe she should remember why she was here to begin with, go find Patrick, and yell at him or something. She hadn’t seen him recently, but maybe Jake could help her track him down?

It turned out being a lot easier than she expected, though, because as soon as she turned the corner around the side of the house — lo and behold, there was the man himself, leaning against the wall and staring up at the sky.

Because Stevie was feeling a smidge feisty and quite a bit defensive of David, she asked, louder than necessary, “Whatcha lookin’ for up there, your girlfriend?”

Patrick jumped, looking wildly at Stevie as if she was an axe murderer in a Slenderman mask and not a short 17-year-old in a too-big bomber jacket. “Holy — Jesus, Stevie, you scared me,” he said as he caught his breath. 

“But like, are you?” Stevie asked. “Looking for Rachel?”

“Uh, no. She’s sleeping upstairs.” Patrick shoved his hands in his pockets. “She’s also not my girlfriend.”

“Hm.”

“Where’s David?” he asked. 

Stevie crossed her arms. She read somewhere that it was a power stance, so it seemed appropriate, given that she was about to eviscerate this kid for doing David dirty. “He left.”

Patrick furrowed his brow. “Without you?”

“Yeah. He walked back to the motel.”

“He _walked_?” Somewhere in the back of her head, Stevie allotted Patrick one point for knowing this was out of character for David, and negative a thousand points for _literally everything else he had done that night._

“He walked.” Stevie pulled out her lighter and lit up her joint, very intentionally not offering any to Patrick. “Dude, you need to get yourself together. David doesn’t deserve this.”

Patrick looked at her a bit like a deer in headlights. “What?”

Stevie rolled her eyes. The guy might be drowning in AP classes, but boy was he dumb. “Well. You kissed. Then you ran away and stopped talking to him. Then you finally start talking to him again, but only because he drunk texts you. And then the first time he sees you in person since the fated kiss and run, you ignore him and let your ex-girlfriend hang all over you.”

Patrick shook his head vehemently. “It’s not like that. She was just drunk and I wanted to make sure she was okay so I—"

“Cool," Stevie interrupted, "but David doesn’t know that. All David knows is that you won’t talk to him when any of your friends are around.”

Patrick sighed. “To be fair, David also—”

“Stop making excuses. It doesn’t matter what David has been doing, it’s well-established at this point that he’s an idiot. And while I have eyes and can see that you are hopelessly into him, you’re kind of giving him mixed signals by ignoring him at parties, because historically, in his fucked-up rich people life, even the people who _did_ talk to him at parties didn’t actually like him.” Patrick looked rightfully chastened, but didn't answer, so Stevie decided to try a different approach. “What, do you think people are gonna be dicks about you being bi, or gay, or whatever you are?” Patrick just shrugged. “Last year we had a trans prom queen. What the fuck are you worried about?”

Patrick shook his head. “I don’t know. I’m just… scared.”

“Okay, that’s fine. But if you’re scared, you need to tell David that’s why you’re acting like this. Because from his perspective, you look like a dick.”

Stevie watched as Patrick leaned his head back against the brick and swallowed hard. “I’m not bi. I’m… I’m definitely gay.”

“Okay,” Stevie said, because she had no idea what to say to that.

Then, for some reason, Patrick laughed. “You’re the first person I’ve actually said that to.”

Stevie wasn’t sure if she should still be mad at him, or if she should be proud of him, or if it was maybe possible to do both at once, so she settled on saying, “Maybe David should be the second.” She took a hit of her joint as she considered whether she should go on, but ultimately she said _fuck it_ and said, “And like, I don’t wanna tell you how to do this whole coming out thing, but maybe you should also tell Rachel that? Like, I don’t really know her, or you, to be honest, but I get the vibe that she needs some… clarity. On you two. I mean, I’m not sure how many people saw you savagely friendzone her at midnight, but that shit was brutal.”

Patrick laughed darkly again. “Mm. Glad you saw that.” He paused. “Did David see that?”

“Oh, no,” Stevie said. “He had already finished his thirty minute spiral and dramatically stormed out by then.”

Patrick’s jaw twitched. “What should I do?”

“Dude, this is your dumbass problem. You’re gonna have to deal with it all by yourself.”

“Fair enough.” He studied her for a moment, then said, “You’re a good friend, Stevie.”

Stevie scrunched her nose up and gave him her best side-eye as she took another hit to deal with that monstrosity of a statement. “Ugh, stop. I don’t know why David likes you so much, this sincerity is way too much to handle.”

Patrick smiled, because much like David, he was a mushy disaster. God, these two were made for each other. Then, abruptly, he pushed himself off the wall and nodded to himself. “Alright. Thank you. I have to go now.”

“Where are you going?”

“To deal with my dumbass problem,” he said, before marching towards the road, on a mission. 

Stevie let Patrick get most of the way down the driveway before she took pity on him, laughed, and called after him, “Room seven!” 


	8. Chapter 8

By 1:30am, David had accepted that even his lavender-chamomile melatonin night cream was not going to help him fall asleep, so he had resorted to just laying in his bed stewing. 

He wasn’t sure who he was angrier at: Patrick or himself. Like, sure, Patrick had maybe kind of been a dick. But then again, it was David’s own fault for thinking that this time would be different. It was David’s naive little brain’s fault for thinking anything would be different just because he didn’t have the money anymore, or because he was in a small town with buttoned-up nice people like Patrick, or because this was the first time that David himself had really felt things in any sort of meaningful way. Because he was still David Rose, and he was never going to be anyone’s first choice, and it was clear that was never going to change, no matter how much his circumstances did.

And that was… well, it wasn’t _fine_ , but that was the way it was. Maybe, if David was lucky, Patrick would still talk to him in class, and that would be enough. It would have to be. On the bright side, at least David would never have to go to another fucking hockey game again. 

In an attempt to shut his brain down, David started going through every Givenchy collection in the past decade, trying to bring an image of each piece to the front of his mind. It was working, but only sort of, because thoughts about that stupid dumb horrible cute farmboy just kept popping up without David’s permission. 

He was partway through the Fall 2015 collection when the knocking started. 

David ignored it at first, because lately Alexis had become wont to knock when she was just too lazy to fish her key out of her bottomless purse, and David was trying to _sleep_ , goddammit. The fact that he still had a light on next to his bed that was visible through the curtains was simply none of her concern. So when the knocking paused for a moment, David assumed she’d given up and started the hunt for her keys, but then it started again, and he groaned. 

“Ugh, Alexis, did you lose your fucking key again?” he cried, loud enough that she could definitely hear her, as he threw off his blankets and made his way to the door. “If you brought Ted home you are absolutely _not_ fucking in this room—” 

And then he swung the door open and found someone who was decidedly not Alexis standing on the other side of the threshold. It was Patrick, face flushed from the cold, hair dusted with the snow that had apparently started to fall, and David abruptly forgot why he had been mad at Patrick in the first place. He was looking at him like he was staring into his soul, and David suddenly felt naked, here in his rumpled pajamas and his hair that was probably a huge mess and the puffy bags under his eyes. So David looked back at Patrick and said, very eloquently, “Um.”

Patrick also seemed a bit at a loss for words, which was frankly absurd, because _he_ was the one who had showed up at David’s doorstep in the middle of the night in a very dramatic fashion. Shouldn’t he have like, planned something? How did he get here? David didn’t see his car in the lot, so did he fucking walk? He should’ve had plenty of time to think about what to say during the trek from Mutt’s to here. David would know, he’d done the same walk only an hour and a half earlier and his own thoughts had nearly eaten him alive. 

And then Patrick took the tiniest step forward, and then he glanced down at David’s lips, and of course that made David look at _his_ lips, and _holy fuck what was happening_ , and then there was some leaning and then they were kissing, again. Some emergency alarm was blaring dully in the back of David’s head, screaming, "THIS IS A BAD IDEA, THIS IS A BAD IDEA," but David was only a man, and when Patrick Brewer was kissing him, the only thing his simple brain was capable of doing was kissing back.

Eventually, Patrick pulled away, and David tried to brace himself for the panicked look on Patrick’s face that he’d seen last time this happened, but when David reluctantly opened his eyes, Patrick was all doe-eyed still. David had to force himself to shut his gaping fish mouth. 

“Look, David,” Patrick said, voice rough. He cleared his throat. “I like you. I like you a lot. I just…” He paused, scrunching his nose up in a way that was profoundly cute. “It’s extremely cold and I can’t feel my ears, can I come in?”

David’s eyes widened. “Oh. Yeah.” He stepped aside and Patrick trudged in. David took a moment to make a fruitless attempt at fixing his hair as he shut the door behind him, then turned around to find Patrick assessing the room — his side perfectly made up, Alexis’s side looking vaguely like a tornado had just run through it. 

“So this is where you live, huh?” he asked.

“Yes, unfortunately,” David said. 

Patrick shoved his hands in his pockets, looking nervous in a way David had never seen before. “So, um, I have some things I need to explain.”

“I should think so, yes.”

“Can I…?” Patrick gestured vaguely at the bed that was clearly David’s. David nodded, but didn’t join Patrick in sitting down. He had a feeling he was going to need to do some aggressive, dramatic pacing for whatever this conversation was about to be. “It has… been brought to my attention,” he began, “that I’ve kind of been a dick to you.”

David couldn’t help but bark out a laugh at that. “Mm.”

“And I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have — I should’ve just been straight with you from the jump. But if it’s okay with you, I’d like to explain myself now.” David shrugged from where his pacing had brought him on the other side of the room, and Patrick plowed on. “When we kissed, I kind of… panicked a little.”

David scoffed, kicking at the corner of the dresser. “Understatement.”

Patrick laughed, just a little. “Okay, fair. I panicked a lot. But the reason that I panicked was because I had never… felt that way kissing someone before.”

And because David was a masochist who couldn’t keep his mouth shut, he said, “That bad, huh?”

“No!” Patrick’s eyes were as wide as saucers, and in any other situation it might’ve been funny. “No. That _good_. I was with Rachel for forever, and I love Rachel, I really do—” Patrick seemed to sense David’s discomfort, so he was quick to finish, “but it never felt like that with her. Like I was… I don’t know, _floating_. Like I could die right then and be happy.”

David was very grateful that he hadn’t sat down next to Patrick, because now he was far enough away that if Patrick asked him if he was about to cry, he could have plausible deniability. He tipped his head back to look at the ceiling in an attempt to keep the tears that were quickly forming from betraying him and falling down his face. 

“And that scared me,” Patrick said. “Because it kind of confirmed my recent fears that everything that I thought I knew about myself had been a lie. And so I ran away because I wasn’t ready to face it. And that was really unfair to you. So I’m sorry.” David kind of wanted to say something, but he wasn’t sure what, and he was afraid if he interrupted, Patrick would stop being so honest. So he kept his mouth shut as Patrick said, “And then… I don’t know, I got in my head. You didn’t text me, so I managed to convince myself that I had forced myself on you and that my affection was unwanted.” Again with the _affection,_ why did all of David’s friends talk like Jane Austen heroines? “And so I didn’t text because I didn’t want to smother you, and also because I was afraid that I had ruined whatever we had.”

Patrick took an audibly deep breath, and when David turned to look at him quizzically, Patrick’s ears turned faintly pink. “I also kind of wanted to see if time apart, if not texting you, would make me calm down. And it… did not.” David had to physically bite his tongue to stop himself from making some comment about how _excited_ he had to have been if he needed so badly to calm down. “And then you texted me on Christmas Eve and then it was over. I knew I was in way too deep, there was no point in trying to not be.”

Patrick was staring down at his hands, picking at the skin around his nails, and David was very tempted to tell him in no uncertain terms why he should not be doing that, but there were more pressing questions at hand. “Then why did you ignore me tonight?” David asked, and goddammit, why was his voice coming out so shaky and vulnerable when everything in his head sounded so confident and sure?

“Because I…” Patrick trailed off, looking genuinely distressed now. David had no idea what to do with it. “I didn’t know how to bring these two versions of myself together. I am… very gay, as it turns out, but I haven’t really told anyone that?”

“Well,” David said, “you’ve told me.”

“And Stevie, apparently.” Patrick half-smiled. “I didn’t expect you to be there tonight, to be honest. And I just… I didn’t know how to be the Patrick Brewer that has a hopeless crush on David Rose and the Patrick Brewer that everyone else in Schitt’s Creek knows at the same time. So I kind of freaked out again, which is why I did what I did, I guess. And I know that none of this is an excuse for how I acted, but… it’s what happened. I thought you deserved to know that. And I'm sorry.”

David studied Patrick as he considered all of this — to say it was a lot to take in was an understatement, and he had no idea where to start. Some part of him really wanted to get into the whole “hopeless crush on David Rose” thing, but then another part of him was screaming “HE STILL IGNORED YOU”, and some other part of him was empathetic about Patrick’s struggling to reconcile his gay self with his hockey captain, student council treasurer, teacher’s pet self. David hadn’t exactly experienced it in the same way, because David Rose had always been David Rose, but still… he got it. The whole coming out process was a lot to deal with. 

“Can you say something?” Patrick asked, snapping David out of his reverie. “You usually have very loud opinions on things, so you not saying anything is kind of freaking me out.”

David, very graciously ignoring the fact that Patrick called his opinions _loud_ , asked, “So what do you want now?”

This was very clearly not the response Patrick was expecting, and it took him a minute to answer. He let out a shuddering breath. “I want to be together. If, if you do, of course. I mean, I’m not—” He awkwardly cut himself off, and David had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling, because he was a simpleton who would never not find consent sexy. “Anyway. I don’t know if I would be ready for it to be a huge public thing yet, but that’s not because I’m ashamed of you or anything.” He gave David an imploring look, and dammit, David was so far gone. “I just need time.”

The half-whispered word was already out of David’s mouth before he could even think about what he was doing. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Patrick asked. 

David let out a breath that he’d been holding for who knows how long. “Okay.”

Patrick’s nonexistent eyebrows raised slightly, surprised that David hadn’t said more, and honestly, David was surprised, too. He had plenty of things to say, to be sure, and he would surely be saying them at some point. But right now Patrick was sitting on his bed and telling David that he _wanted him_ and his stupid hormone-ridden brain could only think about kissing Patrick, it seemed. 

So he marched on over and he did. 

Because Patrick was sitting down, David had to lean down quite a bit to reach him, but Patrick didn’t jerk away when David put his hands on his face this time, instead just placing his own hands on David’s sides, so David didn’t give a fuck about the slight crick in his neck because everything about this just felt so _right_.

Some indeterminate amount of time later, when he and Patrick were laying on David’s tiny bed doing some perfectly innocent necking — usually by this point he would be much further along in the process of hooking up, but with Patrick David didn’t even care, he’d be happy to make out with Patrick forever — was when Alexis _actually_ came home. And look, if David was so distracted that he didn’t even notice when she came in, that was Patrick’s fault, really. 

For what it was worth, Patrick seemed equally as dazed and jumped nearly as much when Alexis shrieked from the doorway, “DAY-VID!!!” He turned to see her making the most disgusting happy face and _clapping_ like she was at a goddamn circus, and she continued, paying no mind to the fact that it was the middle of the night, “THIS IS A TURN OF EVENTS!!!”

David collapsed into Patrick’s side, groaning, while Patrick had the audacity to laugh. “Dear god, Alexis,” David grumbled, “shut your face.”

“Hi Alexis,” Patrick said, absently stroking David’s hair, and David knew without looking that Patrick was a blushing mess right now.

“Hi _Patrick_ ,” she said, and he could tell without looking at _her_ that her eyes were sparkling like crazy and oh dear god this was the worst thing to ever happen to him. “I see David finally came to his senses.”

“Something like that,” Patrick mumbled, and David appreciated him not going into any detail, because he did not need that right now.

“But also, David,” she continued, “we have rules about these sorts of things, and if I’m not allowed to have Ted in here when you’re around then—”

“Oh my god, _fine._ ” Alexis was so insufferable. “Patrick, you have to go home,” David said, but made no effort to move from where he was curled up against Patrick’s shoulder. 

“This is all very cute,” Alexis said after a second, “but sending him home does actually require you letting him get up.” With another dramatic groan, David shifted so that Patrick could more easily get up, simultaneously shooting Alexis a patented David Rose glare. With a giggle — oh, David liked that sound, he wanted more of that — Patrick rolled off the bed in a manner that should’ve been more awkward-looking but simply wasn’t, because this man was an enigma of athletic ability.

“Happy New Year, Alexis,” Patrick said as he put on his coat, and David made a still-somewhat-dazed attempt to sit up in his bed. 

“Happy New Year, Patrick,” she replied, booping him on the nose. 

Then Patrick turned to David. “I’ll text you tomorrow?”

David twisted his mouth up every which way to avoid breaking out in a giant toothy smile, because he was _not_ going to let Alexis see him like that. “Please.” Patrick hesitated at the door for a second, then crossed over to David in two long strides, kissed him right on the mouth one last time, and was out the door with a grin.

Immediately, David grabbed his pillow and hid his head under it to avoid all of Alexis’s pointed looks. “Shut up shut up shut up,” he said, but was almost certain Alexis could still hear the uncontrollable smile in his voice, because she just laughed like the evil piece of work she was on her way to do her nightly routine.

Before she was even back from the bathroom, David was already out like a light, with _Patrick Patrick Patrick_ running like a banner through his head. 

* * *

Stevie knew almost immediately, because Alexis was a blabbermouth and Stevie always found a way to know everything. Which meant that when David finally woke up on New Year’s Day and promptly checked his phone for texts from Patrick, he was also greeted by a text from Stevie that just said “YOU’RE WELCOME.”

David responded with a tasteful middle finger emoji, knowing that both she and Alexis were going to be absolutely unbearable for the duration of this relationship, but he was too happy to even care. 

* * *

After New Year’s, Patrick’s aunt and uncle had come to visit, and David had promised his mom he would help her with her yearly wig cleaning, and Patrick had hockey practice, and both of them had a bunch of neglected winter break homework to catch up on, so they didn’t get to see each other in person before school started back up. Which meant that a few days later, on the first day back, David wouldn’t say he was ecstatic to head to AP Studio Art, because David Rose didn’t do _ecstatic_ , but he was pretty damn close. He may have zoned out in his math class thinking about his upcoming class with Patrick, which meant that he had no idea what they had learned, which meant that he would have an excuse to talk to Patrick more in asking for his help, and really, who was he to complain about that?

He hustled back to his locker as soon as he was out of math, ready to gun it to the art room, but was surprised when he found Patrick already there, waiting for him. Managing to tamp down his smile while also shooting Patrick a confused look was a feat of nature, and really, David should’ve won an Oscar for the control he exerted over his own face in that moment. 

“Hello,” Patrick said, as if it was a totally normal occurrence for him to be found leaning against the sophomore locker bank that David had been stuffed into when he registered for school at the last minute.

“How did you know where my locker was?” David asked, as he very smoothly managed to fuck up his locker combination and had to put it in again. 

“I know a lot of things, David Rose,” Patrick replied. 

“Is one of them knowing how to come off as mildly stalkerish by showing up at people’s lockers unannounced and being vague about how you knew exactly which one was theirs?”

“Yes, it’s a skill I’ve honed over the years.”

“Mm, good to know,” David said as he switched out his books and closed the locker with a flourish. “Shall we?”

“We shall,” Patrick said with a sly smile that told David that he knew exactly how much David was going to hate him for replying that way. 

They got a handful of strange looks as they walked to class together, but this wasn’t unexpected for David. Although maybe strange wasn’t the right word — most people just seemed surprised. Or curious. Or both. Which, fair, they made for an interesting pair. And most people (okay, everyone but Stevie) just thought they had some weird friendship, but David got to relish in the fact that all of those people were wrong, and boy would they be surprised when they found out (assuming they ever would, but David pushed _that_ invasive thought right on out of his mind) that he and Patrick were… well, he wasn’t sure what exactly they were, but they were _something_. More than anyone else thought, at least.

Art was good. Weirdly normal, but their banter felt somehow heightened, as if — as if they were both in on the joke now. So David teased Patrick for his lack of artistic skill, as usual, and Patrick teased David about literally everything else, as usual, but it was somehow even better than before. It was really fucking good. 

And when Ms. Segal announced that they would be starting a new portraiture unit and Patrick asked who David was going to draw, David wanted to do nothing more than spit his soul out on the table and say _you, I’m drawing you, because you are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen and I need to preserve every moment I get to have you before you leave me._

But that was obviously too much to say over a grimy art table that had at least four different types of gum stuck to the bottom of it and a dick carved in the side. Even admitting that he was going to draw Patrick seemed too much for David to say right now. And if he played his cards right, angled his paper and pencils and arms just so, well, it could be weeks before Patrick figured out who he was actually drawing. So David looked at Patrick and lied, “Mariah Carey, of course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's still three more chapters! Whatever might happen!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look. Sometimes you have to use the phrase "*gestures vaguely*" in a fic, and there's nothing you can do about it.

Patrick had been saying he was wanting to tell Rachel about… *gestures vaguely* everything, but he hadn’t really given David a timeline. Which was fine. Like, actually fine, not ranting-on-New-Year’s-Eve fine. Coming out was a very personal process — Patrick deserved to do it on his own terms, and no one else’s. David would just be here to support him and hold his hand ( _god,_ that they could hold hands now) along the way, no matter how long it took him. 

All of this to say, David wasn’t expecting it when Rachel came up to him and Stevie at a hockey game in mid-January, no foam fingers to be found, and just sat next to him. 

“Um, yes?” David said, because what the hell was going on. “Did you need something?”

“No, just came by to say hi. See how things were going,” Rachel said with a smile, and _what the everloving fuck was going on_.

“Fine?”

“And how’s Patrick?”

David’s eyes widened. He had no idea how to get out of this, so he just went with a vague, “You tell me.”

Inexplicably, Rachel laughed. “Ohhhh, he didn’t tell you that he told me about you guys, did he? What an idiot, god love him.”

“Oh,” David said, startled. “Um, no, he did not.”

“Well, he’s never been great at communication. I did my best with him, but like… good luck, man.”

The casual way she was talking about this — about her ex-boyfriend suddenly coming out as gay and announcing to her that he was dating the black sheep in school — was absolutely baffling to David and he had no idea what to do with it. “So you’re… not mad, or anything?” David asked, immediately cringing at how insecure he sounded. He was David fucking Rose, why was he so afraid of what this short little hicktown redhead thought? Next to him, Stevie sniggered, and David soundly ignored her. 

“Nah. I mean, it explains a lot, actually. And there’s the whole getting over him thing, but that’s my problem, not his or yours or anyone else’s,” Rachel said with a shrug. David thought of all of his exes that had gotten mad when he’d so much as looked at another person too soon after the breakup and wondered how the fuck he’d ended up here. (He had no idea, but he’d do it again and again and again if it meant that he got to keep Patrick.)

“Oh,” David said, because it seemed that his vocabulary had been reduced to that one word. “That’s good. Um, good luck, I guess?” Stevie laughed again, and this time, David took the liberty of whacking her in the leg. 

But Rachel just kept smiling, and good god, everyone in this town was so nice it kind of made David nauseous. “Thanks. And, by the way, don’t worry about the fact that we used to be together. It doesn’t have to be weird. But also, Patrick is still my best friend, so if you break his heart I’ll kick your ass.”

Why was David blushing at this? Why? What was going on in his witless little pea brain? “I will keep that in mind,” he finally said. 

At this point, Stevie finally rescued him. “Do you need someone to kick Patrick’s ass for breaking your heart? Because honestly I think I could take him in a fight, he’s not that big and I’ve got a mean left hook.”

“No,” Rachel said, “but I do give you full permission to kick his ass if he breaks David’s heart. It’s only fair.”

“Cool,” Stevie said. 

There was a bit of an awkward lull in the conversation, but Rachel eventually said, “Well, I’ll let you two go.” She stood up and turned back to face them, pausing for a moment as if trying to decide if she wanted to say something, before clearly saying _fuck it_ and saying with a laugh so wonderful that it rivaled only Patrick Brewer himself, “Honestly, I have no idea how he pulled this off. You’re so out of his league.” 

David had to bite his tongue to avoid saying something embarrassing like how Patrick was the one who was out of _his_ league, and how he was better by far than even the best people David had ever dated before. While he was still contemplating how he should respond, Stevie, the meddling fucker she was, piped up, “The fact that he’s hot is balanced out by his immense emotional baggage.”

“Wow, thank you so much,” David grumbled. 

But Rachel just laughed again and touched David’s arm and said, “Enjoy the game, guys,” and then she was gone. 

* * *

“So,” David said when he went outside after the game and found Patrick already waiting for him, “when were you gonna tell me that you told Rachel about us?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Patrick said, “I was thinking later tonight, after I brought you to that diner in Elmdale with the really good hash browns.”

David’s eyes lit up, 50% because what with Patrick not being out and their busy schedules (okay, Patrick’s busy schedule), it meant they hadn’t gotten the chance to get out of town for a real date yet, and 50% because those hash browns were _really_ fucking good. “Wait, really?”

Patrick grinned and heaved his gigantic hockey bag over his shoulder. “Yeah, let’s go.”

“Wait, I should tell Stevie that—”

“I already told Stevie,” Patrick called, already walking away.

“Well that was rather presumptuous of you,” David said, jogging lightly (David Rose did not _run_ ) to catch up, “assuming I would say yes to your scandalous proposition of luring me to a secondary location with hash browns.”

Patrick stopped in his tracks and turned to face David head-on. “David Rose, may I take you to a secondary location where we will each eat our body weight in hash browns?”

“I suppose I could be amenable to that,” David said, trying not to smile as Patrick grabbed him by the arm and bodily dragged him over to his clunker of a car. 

And when, about halfway through the car ride, Patrick took his hand over the center console — well, David was amenable to that, too.

However, some time later, when Patrick was throwing straw wrappers at him from across the booth like a five-year-old with wicked precision, David was slightly less amenable. “Excuse _you_ ,” David said over his menu, “I am not to be disturbed while I am making this life-altering gastronomic decision.”

“What are you deciding between?”

“These Nutella pancakes are appealing, but I’m a little wary of them referring to Nutella as ‘hazelnut-chocolate spread’, because if they’re not buying brand name, what’s the point? I’m also very tempted by this challah French toast, but at the same time I don’t really trust these rural goys to make a palatable challah.”

“But David,” Patrick said innocently, “we’re in the major metropolitan hub of Elmdale. These must be _semi-_ rural goys, at the very least.”

“You’re insufferable,” David announced. 

“How about I make you a deal. We order both, and then split them.”

David eyed him. “I don’t share food.”

“Okay, when I say we’ll split them, I mean you’ll eat most of them and I’ll just have a small sampling of each, because I really should be eating protein after a game, so I’m going to order an ungodly amount of eggs and ham.”

David considered this. It seemed dangerous to offer Patrick _any_ of his food, especially after he did his sportsing. But also, Patrick had some very convincing puppy dog eyes, so David put his menu down with a flourish and conceded, “Fine. But only if we get separate orders of hash browns.”

Patrick smiled. “Deal.”

Their waitress was apparently clairvoyant, because she arrived at exactly that moment to take their orders, but once she was gone, David settled back and studied Patrick. His hair was getting long, and David stared at a rogue curl falling onto his forehead when he asked, “So it went okay with Rachel?”

Patrick fiddled with a napkin. “Yeah. She took it pretty well. I don’t know that she necessarily expected the why of everything, but. We’d been broken up for almost six months, I think she was starting to get the idea that we really weren’t getting back together this time.” He paused, but David had the feeling he wasn’t done yet, so he let the silence sit. “But it was still hard.”

David nodded, proud as fuck of his — his Patrick, but completely unequipped to convey this sentiment without spontaneously combusting. So he just said, “I don’t mean to ‘it gets better _’_ you, because that would be incredibly annoying, but coming out does get easier the more you do it.”

“I hope so. But better for her to know now than ten years down the line when we’re married and have two and a half kids, I guess.”

David raised an eyebrow. “You actually thought you were gonna marry her?” 

Patrick just shrugged. “That’s what everyone was expecting would happen.”

“Doing what people expect you to do is bullshit.”

Patrick scrunched his nose up, looking like a fluffy, curly little bunny in a hockey jersey. It was offensive. “Easy for you to say.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” David asked, but it wasn’t even accusatory, because this little bunny man was making him soft. 

Patrick’s napkin fiddling was turning into napkin origami. “I don’t know. You’re just so… you.”

“I can’t tell if that’s a compliment or an insult.”

Patrick laughed. “It’s a compliment. You’ve got the confidence of someone who has always known who they are, other people’s expectations be damned.”

David scoffed, and before he could even think about what he was doing, he blurted, “Tell that to Lindsay Lohan’s little sister, who once convinced me to buy this hideous denim vest with orange hardware that wasn’t even cute in 2012.” He gestured at his current (very cute) monochrome look. “Trust me, this carefully curated aesthetic is the result of a lot of trial, error, and ultimately learning to ignore the fashion advice of anyone except Anna Wintour herself.”

“Oh, of course,” Patrick said. “One should always listen to Anne Winter.”

David eyed him. “You don’t know who Anna Wintour is, do you?”

Patrick grinned. “No, not at all.”

“You’re a disgrace,” David said, before going on a long rant about who Anna Wintour was and why it was insane that Patrick didn’t know, and at the very least had he seen _The Devil Wears Prada_? (In a terrifying and outright scandalous turn of events, he had not, so David put that right at the top of the list of movies he was going to force Patrick to watch ASAP.) 

By the time their food came out, their conversation had somehow shifted to the fact that Willie Mays and Billy Mays were apparently _not_ the same person (who knew?) and David was so engrossed in the passion Patrick had for whatever insane sports escapades he was talking about that he almost didn’t want to interrupt the conversation for the consumption of perfectly-browned hash browns. Almost. 

* * *

“Are you really drawing that whole thing without a reference photo?” Patrick asked one day in art.

“What?” David asked, because he had spent the last ten minutes staring at Patrick’s nose, wondering what he was doing wrong that it kept coming out too pointy in his drawing, and he honestly had no idea what Patrick was talking about. 

“Your portrait. I haven’t seen you use a single reference photo of Mariah Carey.”

“Oh,” David said, angling his arm just a little bit more to make sure Patrick couldn’t see what he was doing. “She’s an icon, so I have her face memorized. I don’t need references.”

“I see my mom every day and I still needed like twelve reference photos.” (When Patrick told David that he was drawing his mom, his eyes rolled out of his head, because _of course_ model child Patrick Brewer would draw his mom. Patrick claimed he was just getting ahead of the Mother’s Day game, but David knew better.)

“All due respect to Marcy Brewer, but we can’t all have as memorable faces as Mariah.”

“All due respect to your very smart brain,” — David scoffed, but Patrick soldiered on — “but unless you have a photographic memory you’re not telling me about, I just don’t believe even you could pull that off.”

“Well, you’re going to be very surprised when this turns out to be the best portrait of Mariah Carey you’ve ever seen,” David said, because what was art class for if not digging himself into a hole that he would literally never be able to climb out of?

“Can I see it, then?” Patrick asked with a pointed look. 

David tugged his drawing even closer. The drawing was still a semi-rough outline, but it was completed enough that with one look Patrick would be able to immediately see that it was not Mariah Carey. “No.”

Patrick laughed goodnaturedly. “Why are you being so cagey? I’ve seen all your other stuff as works in progress, it’s not like I’m gonna judge you. I mean, have you seen mine? I’ve made my mom look vaguely like Yoda.”

“Mariah must be seen as a complete work of art, all at once,” David said primly. “Don’t embarrass her by trying to sneak a peek when she’s not ready.”

At that point, Ms. Segal came over to their table and asked, “How are we doing, boys?” so of course Patrick jumped on the opportunity to be nosy. 

“Great question, Ms. Segal,” he said, “David won’t show me what he’s working on, so I wouldn’t know.”

“And I am under no obligation to show you,” David argued. 

“Ah, but you do have to show me,” Ms. Segal said, coming around to stand behind David. He reluctantly shifted his arms just enough that she could see it while still hiding the bulk of it from Patrick’s view. 

“Please, Ms. Segal,” Patrick begged, and if you asked David, he was really laying it on thick. “Tell me. Does it look eerily like Mariah Carey, like so much so that it's an uncanny valley sort of situation?” She looked at Patrick, then back at the drawing. It was obviously of him. “Does David have a secret photographic memory that is just of Mariah Carey’s face that he’s been hiding from us?”

And then Ms. Segal, bless her goddamn soul, just raised an eyebrow at David and said, “It’s an excellent likeness to the subject so far.”

“See?” David said, breathing out a sigh of relief. “Now, instead of meddling in my business, maybe you should take this time to ask Ms. Segal how to make your mom look less like Yoda.”

Patrick stuck his tongue out like the child he was, and then turned to Ms. Segal. “Although my mother makes for a very beautiful Yoda, I would prefer it if she looked less like Yoda. How do I do that?” And the two of them dating certainly didn’t make Patrick any less annoying, so if David smiled at that, it was because his drawing sort of _did_ look like Yoda and _not_ because he thought Patrick being his annoying self was cute or anything. To be clear.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ARO STEVIE BUDD RIGHTS

By the time early February had rolled around, David and Stevie had gotten into the habit of posting up at the table in David’s motel room after Stevie’s weeknight shifts got off, eating stale cinnamon rolls left over from that morning’s continental breakfast, and either doing their homework or “doing their homework”, depending on the day. 

One such day, Stevie looked up from the essay she was writing and said, out of the blue, “I think I’m gonna ask Jake to Sadie’s.”

David looked up at her warily. “Why?” Just the week prior they had both been complaining about how obnoxious and allonormative it was that their school was going so gung ho on the Valentine’s Day thing that they had lined it up with the annual Sadie Hawkins Dance that year, so this announcement was something of a curveball for David. (Patrick had been teaching him sports in preparation for the upcoming baseball season, so he _did_ know what that meant, thank you very much.)

“I don’t know,” she said with a shrug, as if deciding to go to a cheesy school dance after being so eager to skip homecoming with David was just a casual thing to do. “I’m bored. Jake’s hot. Could get some free booze out of it if I play my cards right.”

“You are a menace who is motivated by nothing but free booze and excellent facial structure.”

Stevie raised an eyebrow. “And you’re not?”

“Not so much that I would subject myself to that ungodly school dance.”

“Oh, come on,” she said, dropping all pretense of actually being productive and shutting her ancient laptop. “Since your little boo-thing is student council treasurer, I bet you could even get free tickets.”

“Okay, one, never refer to him as my ‘little boo-thing’ ever again,” David said, pointing an index finger right in her face, “and two, that would be a no-go anyway, because unfortunately, said student council treasurer ran on an anti-corruption platform and refuses to budge on the matter. I tried to get him to use the money they raised to repair the water damage in the gym from last year’s ill-fated senior prank to get cuter outfits for all the sports, and he refused.”

“A sensible request.”

“I mean, if he’s gonna force me to come to his sporting events, at least make the costumes less disturbing. If we _have_ to stick with those godforsaken school colors, they should at least mute them a little so they stop assaulting my eyes. But Patrick said that it ‘would be immoral to use the money for fraudulent purposes,’ and that I of all people should understand that, which, rude.”

Stevie huffed. “I can’t believe you’re dating a straightedge.”

“Excuse you,” David interjected, “I’ve dated all sorts of people.”

“Oh, sorry,” she said, deadpan, “what I meant to say is that I can’t believe you’re _successfully_ dating a straightedge. Like, I bet he’s so nice that he still helps you with your math homework even though he already got in your pants.”

David glared at her, but that didn’t stop his cheeks from heating up just a smidge. “You don’t know the first thing about what he is or isn’t doing in my pants.”

“But does he still help you with math?” she asked. 

“Yes,” David grumbled.

“Alright, my point stands.”

“Well, for the record, I’m shocked Jake is even still with you and not hooking up with other people by now,” David said defensively, apparently because his psyche couldn’t pretend to be well-adjusted for a single second.

“I never said he wasn’t,” Stevie said, casually taking a sip from the disgusting fruit drink she had stolen from the motel vending machine. 

“Wait, what?”

She shrugged. “I mean, it’s not like we ever had a conversation about being exclusive. We don’t even really go on dates or anything, and I’m not like… invested in the romance of it all. I don’t really care if he’s hooking up with other people.”

“You and I are very different people,” David said seriously. Then— “Wait, me and Patrick have never talked about exclusivity. Do you think _he’s_ hooking up with other people?”

Stevie had the audacity to laugh at David’s mounting panic. “Trust me David, you’re exclusive.”

“But if we’ve never talked about it — Stevie, stop laughing, I’ve had enough people cheat on me or tell me after the fact that they had considered it an open relationship to—”

“David,” Stevie interrupted, looking at him like she was talking down a toddler, “Patrick thinks the sun shines out of your ass. I have no idea why, because you’re a disaster, but he does. I mean, he came out to his ex-girlfriend-slash-best-friend for you, just because he wanted her to know. You’re fine.”

“You make it sound so easy,” David said with a groan.

“Because it is. Now hand me the last cinnamon roll.”

* * *

It was getting harder and harder to hide his drawing from Patrick now that it was really taking shape, but David was persevering, strategically placing stacks of books and water bottles and pencils. One day he was sitting there, wondering if anyone would notice if he straight-up Mona Lisa’ed this portrait and just didn’t draw any eyebrows, when Patrick caught David’s gaze over his growing pile of notebooks and said, with those earnest lil eyes, “We should go to Sadie’s.”

David nearly choked on his own spit. He glanced around furtively to make sure no one was too close — up until this moment, whenever they talked at school, it might’ve been playful and banter-y, but they intentionally steered clear of anything that would indicate a relationship. “What?”

Patrick just shrugged. “I’m ready. I… I told my parents. And I’m sick of everything being a secret, I want to just dive in. So… come to Sadie’s with me.”

David was stuck somewhere between immense pride that Patrick had come out to his parents (and that it had presumably gone well?) and abject terror that Patrick seemed so willing to go public so soon. David hadn’t prepared for this. He thought it’d be a few months, at least — he hadn’t expected that Patrick would just say _fuck it_ a month in. David had been happy to delay going public for as long as necessary — and it was all for Patrick, he had told himself. Whatever he needed. But as the rising panic in his system was now making him aware, perhaps it hadn’t _all_ been for Patrick. 

Not prepared to respond to Patrick’s request, David just settled on, “Hm.”

“ _Hm_ , what?” Patrick asked, but he was smiling. Good. That was good. That meant David was being successful in hiding his panic, good good good. 

“Well, I’m not exactly a school dance kind of person,” David said quietly, hoping he could get out of this easily. 

No such luck. “I know that. But I want to go, and I already know you’re not busy this weekend. Please, for me?” To top it all off, Patrick was talking at a volume much higher than David was comfortable with given the proximity of other students. 

“School dances are an antiquated, heteronormative establishment, and just because this particular one encourages girls to do the asking out doesn’t mean that—”

“David,” Patrick said, and that twinkle in his eye was not going to work on David this time, it was _not_ , “come to Sadie’s with me.”

“Well, technically,” David babbled helplessly, “neither of us is a girl so can we even—”

“David,” Patrick interrupted, placing a hand on top of David’s stack of books. “Please.”

“I—” David started, before immediately cutting himself off. He really didn’t trust his own mouth.

“So you’ll come to sporting events for me but not school dances, is that where the line is?” Patrick asked, but he still looked amused, which was good, very good. 

“It’s not about that,” David blurted.

Patrick was so sincere when he spoke next, so kind, so patient. He was too good for David, he was too fucking good. “Then what is it about?”

David cringed. “Well, going to a sportsing game is a little different from going with you to a dance. As your date.”

Patrick no longer looked amused. “And?”

“I just don’t know if that is the right next move… for us.”

Patrick pulled his hand back, and absently, David noticed that there was a crinkle between his eyebrows that he had never seen before. “David, what is this about? You’re already out. Are you ashamed of me or something?”

“No!” David cried, before immediately lowering his volume when Aubrey at the next table over gave him a weird look. “It’s not about you. It’s about me. And my… reputation.” As soon as it came out of his mouth, David knew it sounded awful, and he wanted nothing more than to curl up into a ball and sink to the center of the Earth.

“Your reputation,” Patrick repeated, flat.

David floundered. “I mean, people see me a certain way. I’m not exactly the type people expect to, to date a likable jock.”

“I thought doing what other people expect you to do was bullshit.”

“Well, yes, but I have a certain aesthetic to maintain.”

“Right, so I don’t match your aesthetic,” Patrick said coldly. “Got it.”

“That’s not what I meant!” David exclaimed, frantically trying to pull focus from his horrible hole he had dug himself into, “I just mean, what if it gets out to the outside world and all my old friends see it and just think that I’m all settled down, that I’m just having a grand time in this hick-infested shithole—”

“Oh, so you’re settling for me? I’m one of the hicks infesting this shithole that you’re stuck in and you’re apparently having a not-grand time dating me? Would you describe it as _awful,_ or _horrific,_ or... _?_ ” Patrick asked, and David had never seen his jaw clench like that. 

“It’s not about you!” David whisper-yelled. 

“Okay, but you’re kind of making it about me,” Patrick argued. “I mean, I thought you were okay with keeping things on the down-low because you respected that I wasn’t ready to be out yet, but now that I am... what, it’s fun to fool around, but in the end you won’t go public because I represent the worst of this town, is that it? Because I’ll tie you to Schitt’s Creek?”

David scrubbed his hands down his face, which was in defiance of literally everything every skincare expert had ever told him, but fuck it. “You have to understand that moving here was… a lot, for me. Everything went to shit very quickly, and honestly I’m still adjusting.”

Which was a bold-faced lie. Well, it wasn’t actually a lie, but it definitely wasn’t why David was very suddenly panicking about going public with the best (and most healthy) relationship he had ever happened upon in all of his dating escapades. The reality — the reality that he would never admit to Patrick — was that under his carefully curated teflon exterior, his emotions were a gooey, catastrophic fucking mess.

Because liking Patrick, _theoretically_ dating him, that was great. Back in the fall, David could fantasize about it as much as he wanted while simultaneously denying it every time Stevie brought it up, because he never thought he would actually get to have Patrick. That was David’s wheelhouse. And then David got to actually have him, but it was all a secret, and to be quite honest, that was David’s wheelhouse, too. He had been the dirty little secret more times than he could count. It was a role he knew how to play. 

But if it all became real, if it became public? That would be putting David on unprecedented ground. Because David _liked_ Patrick. He liked him a _lot_ . And if they went public, the stakes would be all that much higher. When it inevitably fell apart, everyone would know. Everyone would have been able to see how much David fucking _liked_ Patrick, because he was known for a lot of things, but having control over his facial expressions was not one of them, and he knew that every time he got to look at Patrick unguarded he turned into a soft, mushy puddle. And everyone would know that David was not only capable of being a soft, mushy puddle of a person, but he, at the core of it all, _was_ one, and his wearing Alexander McQueen like armor was just a reflection of the fact that he had tried to train himself out of showing vulnerability long ago. 

David hadn’t prepared himself to suddenly show the world that vulnerability, because he didn’t think he was going to have to. He thought Patrick would've gotten bored of him long before he was ready to publicly come out. And he thought — okay fine, he thought that even if that didn’t happen, if they did make it a few months and Patrick did feel comfortable enough coming out when they were still together, Patrick would be ashamed enough about dating David “Most Likely to Contract an STI” Rose that he would want to keep it on the down-low. And _then_ he would leave David at the curb at some point after that. Because Patrick was Patrick and David was David and a relationship like that would just never fly. 

So for Patrick to want to so openly show the world how much he liked David and how much David liked him — it was shocking, and it was terrifying, and frankly it made David very sweaty. Because inevitably, invariably, it would all fall apart. And while David may have been prepared to claw through the heartbreak of losing Patrick in the privacy of his motel room, to do it in front of the entire world... he couldn’t handle something like that. He _couldn’t_. It was easier for David to let Patrick think that he was just a shallow ex-rich kid who didn’t want to go public because Patrick “didn’t match his aesthetic” than to crack open all of the carefully-constructed walls around his heart and let Patrick see how fucking broken he actually was. He was used to being called shallow, he could handle it. He could not handle vulnerability. 

And Patrick’s silence was starting to freak him out, so he just reiterated, “It’s very overwhelming,” and at least that one wasn’t a lie.

Patrick took in a deep breath. “Okay. I get that. But… look, Sadie’s is a smaller dance. It’s not like homecoming or prom where everyone is there, and if we make clear to people that they can’t post anything about us publicly online… would you be willing to try that? For me?”

Looking at Patrick’s broken expression, David wanted to say literally anything else, but the thing that came out of his mouth was, “Patrick, I can’t.”

“Okay, David,” Patrick said, but this time it didn’t sound amused or affectionate or teasing, it just sounded tired. 

David was very, very scared of the answer, but still, he had to ask — “But we’re, um… we’re still… are we still?” 

“Yeah, David,” Patrick said, “We’re fine.” And just like that, he picked up a pencil and resumed working on his drawing. 

They spent the rest of their class like that, in horrible, awkward silence. David couldn’t look at the real Patrick without feeling like all of his organs were made of lead, but when he went to distract himself by burying himself in work, he was taunted by the two-dimensional Patrick on the page before him. 

In the end, David spent the rest of the hour working on drawing Patrick’s nonexistent eyebrows, because that was the only thing he could stomach. Paying attention to any other part of him made David want to uncontrollably slam his own head against the table for being so incredibly unevolved and stupid, stupid, stupid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all had asked for a nice lil 2000 word gut punch, right? Because that's what you got.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will you forgive me if I tell you that this last chapter is giant and contains exactly zero gut punches?

Two days later, David found himself sitting across from an exasperated Stevie at their table in his motel room, homework shoved aside. He was honestly impressed with himself that he’d fended her off for a solid 48 hours before she was able to weasel the truth of this Patrick-related dumpster fire out of him, but since she’d been complaining about him acting weird the entire time, it was bound to happen eventually. So here they were. 

“David,” she said confidently, once he finished his reluctant retelling, “you’re a fucking dumbass.”

“See, this is why I didn’t want to tell you,” David said.

Stevie looked him dead in the eye. She was constantly disappointed in David, but this was certainly the most genuinely disappointed she had ever looked, and it was rather alarming. “Okay, I’ve seen you do some very dumb things, David. You are _skilled_ in the category of dumbassery.”

“Thank you.”

“But this is _by far_ the dumbest thing you’ve ever done.”

David rolled his eyes. “Okay, that’s a bit much. I did tell you about Alexis’s bat mitzvah disaster, right?”

Stevie ignored him and grabbed him by the shoulders, which, okay, that was also a bit much. “Patrick is willing to put himself out there, to very publicly out himself, for you, so that he can be with you — in part because he feels guilty about how he shut you off in public before, and is trying to make up for it — and now you’re pulling out because you’re afraid of what being seen with a popular kid, or a jock, or a fucking student council kid will do to your image? The _wonderful_ reputation you’ve earned by looking down on this town and constantly reminding everyone that you’re better than them, you think that’s more important? Are you trying to be cruel, or is Patrick just collateral damage?”

David pushed her arms off. He really, really couldn’t do this right now. “Oh, fuck you. It is far more nuanced than that and you know it.”

“But that’s what Patrick thinks, right?” 

David deflated, staring at a stain on the floor. Fine, maybe that was exactly what he had led Patrick to believe. Stevie, for her part, looked like she was going to rip her hair out. Or maybe rip David’s hair out. TBD.

“Get a grip, David. Stop trying to actively ruin every good thing you have,” she said, dead serious, and okay, maybe she understood him better than he thought. She sighed, before dropping her arms and continuing, “And — I mean this in the most loving way possible, as the person who is unfortunately your best friend, as someone who is in the same social caste as you, but — publicly dating Patrick might protect you from some of the stupid teenage shit. It’s only going to help you.”

It took David a second to answer, because he was not expecting Stevie to take it in this direction. Maybe she wasn’t reading him as well as he thought? “Yeah, well that stupid teenage shit follows me everywhere I go. Everyone in this town is too nice to say it to my face, but people talking about me behind my back is not exactly new for me, Stevie.”

“Exactly,” she said. “Dating you is not necessarily going to help him, socially. Let’s be real, you’re the black sheep kid in this town’s black sheep family, and the self-described most fucked teenager in the eastern time zone. Whereas Patrick has spent the last couple years being one half of the Schitt’s Creek power couple.”

David rolled his eyes. “I’m a slutty downgrade who was only interesting when I was a first-week novelty, I get it.”

“That’s not what I mean. Well, maybe it is a little, but as far as downgrades go, at least you're a hot one,” she said, and David, against his better judgement, couldn’t help but laugh at that. “What I mean is that he cares about you enough that he’s willing to risk that. He cares about you more than he cares about his social standing, because he’s a good person and for some unknown reason, he really likes you.”

David was quiet for a bit, mostly because he had no valid response to that. As if sensing that, Stevie softened uncharacteristically. “You’re not the only person risking something here. Frankly, he’s risking more than you, because you've only been here a couple months, but this is the only world he knows. So you need to be a big kid and bring him to the fucking dance.”

David sighed. “It’s not that simple.”

“Why not?” Stevie asked.

“Well, because—”

“Do you like him?” she interrupted, and suddenly David found he couldn’t meet her eyes.

“Yes.”

“Do you want to be with him?”

“Yes.”

“Do you trust him?” 

The question knocked David off-balance. This was exactly what David was trying to avoid — the vulnerability, the — 

“I’m gonna take that as a yes,” Stevie said, trampling over David’s quickly spiraling train of thought, but David was not going to let her trample over his spiral without a good fight.

“You can’t take a two-second silence as a yes, Stevie.”

“Then give me an answer,” she pressed. “Do you trust him?”

“I…” David trailed off. “I have not historically been good at trusting people.”

“Oh, I know,” Stevie said. “You’re an emotionally stunted disaster of a person. But that’s not what I asked.”

“Fine,” David conceded. “I want to trust him. I feel like I maybe _can_ trust him. But just because he says that he likes me now and he wants this now doesn’t mean he’ll still feel that way next week.”

“But is Patrick anything like all those people that you’ve _historically_ dated before?”

David’s traitorous mind went straight to Sebastian Raine, because of course it did. “No,” he admitted.

“And don’t you want to be able to do all the stupid, corny couple things that couples do? Like, I don’t know, share a milkshake at the cafe instead of having to go all the way to Elmdale to hide your relationship from nosey Schitt’s Creek townies?

“Sharing a milkshake would be gauche.”

Stevie shot him a look. “David. I know that deep down, you’re just a hopeless romantic. Don’t bullshit me.”

David threw his hands in the air, because Stevie was the literal worst. “Fine. Yes, I want that, are you happy now?”

She nodded at him and then said slowly, “So take him. To fucking Sadie’s. It’s really not as hard as you think it is.”

David stuck his face in his elbow, voice muffled as he said, “I hate this. I don’t wanna do it.”

“Yeah, well it’s called growth. I know that’s like, a new thing for you, but—”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“God, I can’t believe I’m your fucking therapist now. Come on, we’re going to the cafe for dinner and you’re paying,” Stevie said, whacking David on the head before getting up and grabbing her coat.

“Um, why am _I_ paying?” David said indignantly as he looked up at her. 

“Because you’ve exhausted me with all these dumb feelings, and also because you literally owe your entire relationship to me, so this will just be the first tiny chip in repaying that debt.”

David sighed dramatically as he put his own coat on. “I wish I was born as a beautiful hibiscus plant instead of a human person. Life would be so much easier.”

Stevie shoved David towards the door impatiently. “Yeah, and I wish I was born as a potato, but I wasn’t, so instead I’m just going to cannibalistically eat my feelings in fries about it. Let’s go.”

* * *

When Stevie eventually left the cafe to go home, David planned on getting a coffee to go and having a nice, serene (if cold) walk back to the motel. As usual, his plans were foiled by his sister, who was perched up at the counter when David came to grab his drink.

“David!” she exclaimed, grabbing at his arm. “Come to the general store with me!”

“Um, no,” he said. “Go by yourself.”

“Ugh, but I need a discerning eye to help me pick out some new nail polish for Sadie’s this weekend, and Twyla can’t come because she’s working.”

David eyed her. “You’re just going to ignore my advice anyway and land on some insane neon pink, so why bother asking me to begin with?”

“Because if there’s a color you like, I’ll know that the one I get should be like, one or two shades brighter. I’m thinking a nice turquoise.”

“Bold of you to think that the general store sells more than one or two shades of nail polish. If they even have nail polish at all.”

Twyla emerged with David’s drink and piped up, “If they don’t, don’t worry, because they do have white-out, and that can make for great nail polish in a pinch. My great aunt used to use it to paint all the ladies’ nails in her cell block, and then she’d color over the white with these highlighters that she had me sneak in for her when I visited for my seventh birthday. I had a really cool birthday that year.”

David’s voice raised an octave when he said, “Well, that’s reassuring.”

“Thank you, Twy,” Alexis said, snatching David’s beverage out of her hand and promenading away, forcing him to chase after her, right on across the street and into the general store.

They had a whopping five colors of nail polish, as it turned out, none of which was turquoise. Alexis should obviously get the peach color, and David told her as such, but as expected, she brushed off David’s advice and stood there deliberating between a color called “Send Nudes” and one called “Grandma’s Couch”. Not content to just watch her do this and frankly disturbed by the prospect of wearing any brand that named their polishes like that, David stole his coffee back and went wandering the aisles of the rest of the store. 

He was checking out the snacks near the front when the bell above the door rang. David glanced up, out of instinct more than anything, and oh. There stood Patrick Brewer, all bundled up in his cute little hat and his varsity jacket, because he was a walking stereotype. Very suddenly, David realized that although they were — they were dating, they were apparently _together_ still, he literally had no idea what to say to Patrick. Partially because they were in public, but mostly because things had been… weird between them the past few days. Stilted. Like they were both still thinking about The Argument but neither one of them wanted to broach the topic, so they just pretended it had never happened at all. 

“Hey,” Patrick said, hands deep in his pockets. 

“Hey,” David responded. Yep, things were definitely still weird. 

“What brings you here?” Patrick asked, as if he was making small talk with a neighbor he’d met twice, not David. David, who he texted every day and whose tongue had been in his mouth and who he’d come out to his parents for.

“Alexis is getting nail polish. She forced me to come along just so she could ignore my advice,” David said, trying to muster at the very least a chuckle, but the joke fell flat. 

“Ah. Well. My mom sent me for some dish soap.”

“Exciting.”

“Indeed.”

This was excruciating. David glanced back at Alexis and found her still engrossed in Send Nudes or Grandma’s Couch or maybe Grandma’s Nudes, so he lowered his voice and asked Partick, “We’re okay, right?”

Patrick frowned. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t we be okay?”

David laughed darkly. “I can think of a couple reasons.”

“Look, it’s in the past. If you’re fine, I’m fine. Everything’s fine,” Patrick said, but it reminded David of when he’d sat on the stairs with Stevie at Mutt’s New Year’s party and said those same words, over and over again, trying to convince himself of something that was never going to be true.

His conversation with Stevie earlier in the evening hit him like a ton of bricks, and David opened his mouth to say something. What, he wasn’t sure — an olive branch, maybe, or an apology, _anything_ — but then Patrick mumbled something about his mom waiting for him and how he’d see him in class tomorrow, and then he had grabbed the dish soap and was standing at the checkout counter before David could even process what was happening. 

Alexis conveniently took that time to pop up over David’s shoulder out of absolutely nowhere, Grandma’s Couch in hand, and it took all of David’s self control not to let out a blood-curdling scream in her face. She laughed at him and waved the nail polish in his face, and by the time David had his bearings back, the door was closing behind Patrick as he escaped out into the night. 

“What the hell was that?” Alexis asked. “God, David, don’t tell me you’ve already ruined this relationship. He's such a little button.” And then she pushed him out of her way and sauntered up to the counter to pay for her nail polish. As he watched her easy banter with the 60-year-old man at the counter who was already charmed by her wiles — and David hated this absurd comparison, but — he couldn’t help thinking of the easy banter he and Patrick _used_ to have, and god dammit, Stevie was right. This whole thing was the stupidest thing David had ever done, and all the awkwardness was his own fault, and what David really wanted was to just be with Patrick, uninhibited, and there was a very straightforward fix to this problem. All he had to do was follow through with it. Just look Patrick in the eye and ask him a simple question without imploding or exploding or running away or lying.

He could do that. Tomorrow, he would do it. It wasn’t hard. Right?

* * *

David told himself he was going to bring it up during art class. The past few days had been tortuous, really, and this morning he had woken up ready, more than ever, for all of this awkwardness to be over. The random run-ins in town and the weird formal texting had been bad, but their time spent in art had been the worst of it: David had gotten almost no work done on his portrait, which was not good, because it was due on Monday, but it seemed that everything he did was either a) bad, or b) made portrait-Patrick look very… sad. Perhaps this was in part because his real-life reference had been looking somewhat sad recently, but he didn’t _want_ the portrait-Patrick to look sad. Or real Patrick, for that matter. 

So David resolved that he couldn’t wait any longer and would broach the subject of, well, everything, that day in art class. 

He did not.

In his defense, by the time David had finally worked up the nerve to bring it up about halfway through class, Ms. Segal came over and ended up getting into an extended conversation with Patrick about how he could make his shading better now that his drawing of his mother looked a little less like Yoda, and then about whether or not most colleges would give credits for AP Studio Art if he only got a three on the test. By the time this conversation ended, there were only a few minutes left in class, and — okay fine, David chickened out. 

By the end of the day, Stevie had of course weaseled this information out of him, and she told him that she would not drive him home from school unless he talked to Patrick. Honestly, David was relieved — he had always been the kind of person who wouldn’t do something uncomfortable unless someone else put his feet to the fire — but he was also very, very terrified. And maybe a little hopeful. But primarily terrified. 

He squinted. “Okay, but will you at least wait for me until I do?”

Stevie glared at him and said, “You have five minutes.”

“What if it takes more than five minutes?” he asked as she walked away.

She turned back to him briefly and called back over the crowded hallway, “Then you’ll have a really fun walk back to the motel. You did this to yourself, David.”

Which was how David found himself loitering outside the school entrance closest to Patrick’s locker like an absolute stalker and praying to every god he’d never believed in that Patrick hadn’t already hustled out of school like any other teenager would on a Friday afternoon. 

Luckily, Patrick Brewer was not like any other teenager, and a few minutes later, when David was starting to lose hope both that he would catch Patrick and also that he would make it back to Stevie’s car before she left, he spotted Patrick meandering out of the building alongside some of his hockey friends. After but a moment’s hesitation (maybe two, at most), he called out in the least pathetic manner he could muster, “Patrick!”

Patrick turned towards his voice, looking understandably confused. Upon seeing David looking rather sheepish on the other side of the entrance, he said something to his friends and came over with one nonexistent eyebrow raised. “David,” he responded with a half smile. 

For some reason that stupid little half smile of his gave David the courage he couldn’t muster up in class, and he blurted, “Will you go to Sadie’s with me?”

At that, Patrick’s half smile turned into a full-on grin, which boded well, but he didn’t actually answer, which was confusing. After a moment, David started nervously fiddling with his sleeves and rambled, all in one shaky breath, “It was maybe brought to my attention that I was kind of being stupid? And that it was like, pretty shitty for me to lead you to believe that I was embarrassed to be seen with you, because that really wasn’t it, it was more so I’m an incredibly emotionally stunted person and I’ve been burned so many times and I was afraid of the vulnerability of publicly being with you because I _really_ like you and being seen like that really freaked me out, and I’m still like 70% very scared but also the other 30% of me does want to go to Sadie’s with you because that’s what you want, and Stevie bullied me and made me do this, so now I’m asking you back.” David took a deep breath, and as oxygen finally returned to his brain, some unfortunate bits and pieces of his word vomit floated to the front of his head, like when he said that only 30% of him wanted to go to Sadie’s with Patrick and also how Stevie had made him do this? So he grimaced and continued, “I probably shouldn't have said several of those things so could you just like, put me out of my misery and—”

And Patrick, the unequivocally _good_ person that he was, did just that, grabbing David by the back of his neck kissing him. Right there, in front of the school, where really, anyone could have seen them. It was likely that no one did, because it was 20 minutes after school got out on a Friday afternoon and the lot was mostly empty, but they _could have_ seen them, was the point. And it was only making David _very_ anxious instead of _extremely_ anxious, which was progress. 

When Patrick pulled away, he grinned again and said, a little breathy, “Okay. Let’s go to Sadie’s.” And at that, David’s anxiety level rolled back to just _pretty_ anxious, and okay, maybe everything was going to be alright after all. “Okay?” he asked, a question this time. 

“Okay,” David replied, barely a whisper, and with that verbal confirmation that he was fine, that it was fine, that they were fine, that they were doing this together, it was like he was instantaneously a hundred pounds lighter. Then Patrick kissed him again and it was like David was weightless, like he was going to float up into the atmosphere like an unmoored helium balloon.

“You do realize,” Patrick said after, their noses still bumping against each other and David’s eyes still blissfully closed, “that the dance is tomorrow, right? Do you even have something to wear?”

Aghast, David drew back from Patrick, eyebrows somewhere near his hairline (although the fact that he was beaming stupidly was kind of ruining the faux-offense he had originally gone for). “Oh, so it’s fine for you to ask with only four days' notice, but it's not okay for me to ask with one day’s notice? Also, I take offense to that question, because if I have anything, it is something to wear.”

“Fair enough.”

“But I do have a lot of thoughts on what you will be wearing?” David said, figuring that if Patrick was still here at this point he might as well let his _too much_ gene take over. “Because clashing with your date is incorrect.”

“Of course,” Patrick said. “In that case, how about you come over tomorrow afternoon and you can help figure what to wear so that we don’t clash?”

“Yes, please.” David said, before a truly awful thought occurred to him. “Well—”

“Don’t worry, my parents are going to be in Elmdale all afternoon.”

“Oh thank god.” David walked a hand up Patrick’s arm. “Um, one last thing?” he asked, and Patrick hummed. “Stevie was very angry at me for my handling of this whole… scenario, and she left me stranded here, so could you give me a ride back to the motel?”

Patrick laughed, and oh, David had really missed that sound. “Of course. But before we do that… you hungry?”

“What kind of question is that?” David asked, grabbing Patrick’s hand as he blindly led him in the direction of the last remaining cars in the lot. “Yes. Can we go to the Timmy Ho’s in Elm Ridge? I would kill for some Timbits right now.”

An hour later, when Stevie texted David asking if he’d been kidnapped on his walk home, all he sent back was a picture of Patrick holding a box of glorious, glorious Timbits. 

* * *

The following afternoon, David found himself in Patrick’s bedroom, its shelves lined with baseball and hockey trophies, the walls plastered with posters of sportspeople who were probably very famous but whom David obviously didn’t recognize. Although David really wanted to ask Patrick how on Earth he hadn’t figured out he was gay earlier, with all these men in tight pants staring down at him as he went to sleep each night, unfortunately that was going to have to wait, because Patrick had just opened his closet and oh _dear_.

“That,” David announced, “is a lot of blue.”

Patrick looked a bit sheepish as he started rifling through his shirts. “To be honest, I’m not sure I actually own any formalwear that isn’t blue.”

Twenty minutes later, they discovered that Patrick did not, in fact, own any formalwear that was not blue (barring the one white shirt that was missing a button and didn’t fit him anymore, therefore making it absolutely out of the question). This predicament was a problem, but Patrick couldn’t seem to quite grasp the severity of the situation. 

“I mean, if you want less blue, I could just not wear the suit jacket,” he said. “Sadie’s is usually more casual anyway.”

“Um, no,” David said, flapping his hands around to indicate how incredibly incorrect that would be. “I don’t care if everyone else is wearing overalls, we’re going to look hot.”

“Okay, David,” Patrick said with a laugh, holding up a tie. “What about this one?”

David pulled the tie out of Patrick’s hand and held it up to the suit. As he suspected, the damn shades of blue clashed. He groaned. “Absolutely not. I cannot have my boyfriend wearing a blue tie, on a blue shirt, with a blue suit jacket that is a slightly different color than the tie, but not different enough for it to seem intentional. Not even to a shitty school dance. Not allowed.”

“What was that?” Patrick asked, looking at him in a manner that seemed almost… hopeful? What that hell was he — oh, fuck. 

David backpedaled immediately. “I said you can’t wear this tie.”

“Huh,” Patrick said, with a deadly grin, “because I heard something about how your _boyfriend_ couldn’t wear the tie.”

The back of David’s neck was heating up. “I don’t… I don’t recall that part.” 

“Well, my boyfriend doesn’t like the tie,” Patrick said, and David was _not_ going to smile at that, not when it had to do with his — his boyfriend’s horrible fashion choices, but he was also having trouble maintaining control over his face, especially since Patrick was now stepping closer and placing his arms around David’s waist. “So I guess I’ll have to find another tie. Maybe I could check and see what my dad has lying around.”

“Just so you know,” David said, leaning into Patrick and hanging his arms around his neck, “wearing the one puke green tie that your father bought in 1990 to go to a funeral is also incorrect. You can wear one of mine.”

“Will a black tie match, though?” 

David bristled, but didn’t pull back from Patrick, because he wasn’t crazy. “Excuse _you_ , I have ties that aren’t black. My wardrobe can handle a pop of color, I’ll have you know, just not an explosion of it. I have a burgundy one that I think will work quite well with this.”

“Whatever it takes to not be incorrect at a shitty school dance,” Patrick said, leaning forward and kissing David, and David could die right now and be happy. Of course, because he was a demon, Patrick followed it up by saying, “But I’ll have you know that my dad’s one tie that he bought in the 90s is actually brown and striped,” and David physically recoiled at that, which only made Patrick’s sly grin even bigger.

* * *

They ended up having to meet at the dance because, well, they’d gotten a little distracted after going through Patrick’s closet, and by the time they realized how late it was, David knew he was going to need every last minute to go through his extensive pre-dance beauty regimen. So David drove shotgun on the way to the school with Stevie, who had worked a shift at the motel that afternoon anyway, and who was not nearly invested enough or cheesy enough to want to be picked up by Jake or some other pseudo-chivalrous bullshit, and Patrick drove himself. 

Luckily, they managed to escape the motel with David’s mother only fussing over his hair on about 45 separate occasions, and David’s father only crying a little as he took no fewer than 300 photos (although David hoped some of the tears were holdovers from when Alexis had left for the dance earlier in the night, because if his dad was crying this much over _him_ attending a tacky high school dance, it was a bit concerning). When they arrived at the school, Patrick was standing outside waiting, scrolling through his phone and looking very dapper despite the fact that he was wearing exclusively blue and hadn’t even put a tie on yet. “Look at that,” Patrick said when he saw the two of them approaching, “only 20 minutes late. I was expecting at least 25.”

David held an imaginary skirt and did a small curtsy. (Maybe he’d be comfortable wearing something a little more gender-bending at prom — oh god, he was already planning on going to prom — but for their first public appearance, David decided to keep it simple with a classic yet extremely expensive charcoal suit. Based on Patrick’s expression, it was a good choice.)

“I’m gonna head in,” Stevie said. She adjusted her dress and turned to David. “My boobs look okay?”

David glanced at Patrick, whose ears had turned vaguely pink, and looked back to Stevie with a smile. “Yeah, you’re good.”

She nodded her thanks and backed towards the door. “Good luck, idiots. Let me know if I need to deck anyone.”

When she was gone, David turned to Patrick, and the weight of Stevie’s words really hit him. They were about to walk in there together. They were actually going to do this. 

“It’s going to be fine,” Patrick said, reading his mind. 

David took a deep breath and reminded himself that he trusted Patrick. Or at least, he was trying to. It was going to be fine. Everything was fine. To distract himself, he pulled out the tie he had brought for Patrick and started tying it around his neck. “I can put on a tie, David,” Patrick said, laughing, but he thankfully didn’t try to stop David. 

David glanced up at Patrick and said, cheeky, “I’m sure that’s what you think, but this tie probably cost more than the rest of your outfit put together, so. I’m just exercising caution.”

As David was readjusting the tie for the thousandth time, he realized that Patrick was staring at him so hard he could feel it. When he finally looked up, Patrick said, “You know, I’m nervous, too.” David gave a noncommittal harrumph, so Patrick continued, “I’m serious. But it’s going to be okay, because we’re doing it together. I want to do this together.” 

Patrick grabbed David by the face, and David jumped. “Oh my god, your hands are freezing.”

“Well, I _have_ been standing out here for like 30 minutes waiting for you,” Patrick said, cocking his head expectantly like he was a fucking golden retriever, and it was cuter than it had any right to be. 

David rolled his eyes. “Alright fine, we can go in.” He let Patrick take his hand with his own icy one, and allowed himself to be dragged into the school, mumbling, “I can’t believe you decided you wanted to come out like this. Absolute drama queen.”

Patrick just turned to look at him with a smirk and said, “I learned from the best.”

Now, David had thought about this part, the whole _walking into the dance_ thing, but the only outcome his brain could supply was a very cinematic moment wherein everyone swiveled their heads around to look at David and Patrick upon their entrance, either breaking out into raucous applause or throwing tomatoes and booing dramatically, depending on the disposition of the masses at the time of their arrival. His one logical brain cell knew this was unlikely, though, so he really didn’t know what to expect. In the end, it was very anticlimactic. 

Mrs. Lee was manning the ticket table at the door, much to Patrick’s dismay, as they still had some sort of weird teacher-student beef that David couldn’t identify or describe but found absolutely hilarious nonetheless. She eyed their entwined hands as she took their tickets and raised an eyebrow at David, but David just shrugged. She turned to appraise Patrick, landing on a somewhat impressed expression, and handed their tickets back. “Enjoy the dance, boys,” she said dryly, and then they just… went in.

The theme was “Winter Wonderland” (which, ugh, kitsch), and the room was teeming with paper snowflakes and fairy lights, because apparently that’s what “winter wonderland” meant to these people. It was… okay, it was not great, but it could’ve been worse. David’s bar for school dance decor had just been set very high and _some_ people in this town (read: everyone) had been trying to teach him to lower his expectations, so. He was doing his best. 

Luckily, the first person to spot them was Rachel, who peeled off from her spot on the dance floor and engulfed both of them in giant hugs. “You came!” she exclaimed when she finally released David and he could breathe again. “I was starting to think you were just gonna let Patrick stand out there all night. Which he totally would’ve, because he’s whipped.”

“Shut up, Rachel,” Patrick mumbled. 

David looked at Patrick, who had turned faintly pink, and smiled. “I would never.”

“Oh my god, you two are so gross. Come dance,” she said, grabbing each of them by the arm and dragging them over to where she had been dancing with some friends. David got a few weird looks, but no one said anything. One of Patrick’s baseball friends… Casey, maybe? He just raised an eyebrow at the two of them together, and then just started using a pretend lasso to pull them closer to the group, which Patrick was far too willing to participate in, if you asked David, but somehow he still managed to get dragged into it himself. 

Some time later David found himself at the center of this weird group of people on the dance floor: Patrick and Rachel, Stevie and Jake, Alexis and Ted, Twyla and Mutt (who had, per Alexis, recently broken up, but seemed rather unbothered by it. The casualness with which these people approached breakups absolutely blew David’s mind, but maybe they were forced to still be friends with each other afterward because there were so few people in this town to begin with? David would ask Patrick later.) And everything felt… fine. Okay, some people were definitely looking at them and whispering, and he was pretty sure he’d seen someone sneak a photo, but Patrick was very good at distracting him. All in all, it seemed that everyone was taking Rachel’s lead and just going with it. 

David eventually managed to escape the throng of sweaty teenagers to acquire something to drink. At the punch table, he happened upon Stevie, who either really liked the questionable beverage Mrs. Schitt had concocted, or she had spiked her cup of it with something. David was guessing the latter, so he went the safe route and took some water. 

“Looks like you’ve survived so far,” Stevie said when David approached. 

“Shut up,” he responded. 

“Apparently Dane Wolter posted a picture of you two to his snap story that had a questionable caption, but I saw Rachel yelling at him and then five minutes later he’d taken the story down, so I decided to spare him a beating.”

“Very generous of you.”

“He’s also kind of stupid and his foot basically lives in his mouth, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt.”

“That’s a first for you.”

“What can I say,” Stevie said with a grin, and she took a swig of her punch, which at this point David was quite certain was spiked. “I’m a woman known for my kindness.” 

The two of them watched the dancers for a little while. Mercifully, David had escaped right before the Wobble came on, and Ted in particular had zero rhythm, so he provided a source of great entertainment for the duration of the deceptively long song. Once it finally wrapped up, something slow came on. It was some cheesy song about being together forever or whatever it was these gross slow dance songs were about, and David was very glad to not be on the dance floor for it. 

Which meant that of course, Patrick materialized out of the crowd and held out an expectant hand to David like he was some prince at a ball, not a high schooler at a shitty school dance full of horny teenagers. “May I have this dance?”

And, okay, David had said he was glad not to be on the dance floor for this. But though he was loath to admit it, there was some part of him, deep down, the part that watched romantic comedies on loop, that was — as Stevie had said — a hopeless romantic, and he kind of really, really did want to have this cheesy high school moment. So he gave in a little too easily when Stevie shoved him towards Patrick, and sure, he rolled his eyes at Patrick’s uber-formal dramatics, but his mouth was betraying him, his smile stretching all the way across his face. And when Patrick took his hand and led him into the dance floor, David didn’t stop him. 

He and Patrick fit together perfectly, comfortably, as if this wasn’t the first time they’d done this. As if they’d been slotted together, slow dancing, since the beginning of time. Since before then. In that nebulous time before the Big Bang, before space or time had actually existed, when the universe was just a dense cluster of matter, the David Rose matter and the Patrick Brewer matter must have been fused together, because bringing them back together, like this — this was just _right_.

And then their faces were _very_ close to each other, and David could feel Patrick’s breath coming out in shallow, uneven puffs, and it was reassuring to know that this was affecting Patrick as much as it was affecting him. “Is this okay?” Patrick asked, when their noses were almost touching.

“Yeah,” David breathed, and then their lips met and they were kissing in the middle of that stupid high school cafeteria filled with sordid paper snowflakes that were somehow all still asymmetrical. Surrounded by people who David had been desperate to convince that he was made of solid teflon and better than them by a mile, who were all most assuredly watching as he kissed — and was kissed by — Patrick Brewer, the boy who had been voted nicest in their entire Schitt’s Creek High School class. Some horribly cheesy song was playing and it was a walking cliche. In theory, David should’ve hated everything about this. But in practice, he was so busy kissing Patrick that everything else simply melted away. 

Then, without warning, Patrick pulled back abruptly. “Wh—” David started, and upon looking down at his face, shouted, “AHH!”, because there was a steady stream of blood coming out of Patrick’s poor, weak nose. He tilted his head back and held his hand up to catch the dripping blood and started laughing hysterically, and anyone who hadn’t been looking at them before was surely looking now.

“Stop _laughing_ ,” David hissed, leading him off to the side and motioning at one of the chaperones to be useful, for god’s sake, “you’re gonna get blood on my tie.”

“And here I was, thinking you were concerned about my wellbeing,” Patrick said, as he took the stack of paper towel Mrs. Gunnarsson had frantically shoved in his hands and promptly stuffed one up his nose. And okay, now David was laughing, too, because Patrick was standing there with a large, stiff, public school-quality paper towel hanging out of his nose and it was nothing if not absurd. 

“That’s a look,” David said. 

Patrick straightened up. “Thank you, it was a part of the Janitor’s 2019 collection.” He shifted the paper towel. “Oh, this is a bad one. Lovely.”

“C’mere,” David said, leading him over to one of the cafeteria tables set up along the walls and sitting them down.

The table was digging into David’s back a bit, because these stupid stools were attached to the table and he couldn’t push them any further out, and Patrick was sitting at a weird angle, partially next to him, partially in front of him. But then Patrick leaned back into David’s chest and tipped his head back slightly onto David’s shoulder, and you couldn’t have paid David any amount of money to move in that moment. 

They watched the dancers for a few minutes, as the slow dance transitioned into something more upbeat. Eventually, Patrick said, “Sorry about my nose. Historically it likes to start bleeding at the most inconvenient times possible.”

“I can’t be too mad,” David said, delicately taking a used paper towel from Patrick and setting it down on the table, very careful not to touch the blood. He handed Patrick another paper towel. “Where would we be without those nosebleeds?”

Patrick smiled. “A compelling argument,” he said, and they settled back into a comfortable silence. Patrick took David’s hand with his free, non-bloodied one, stroking the back of David’s hand with his thumb, and David was fully ready to fuse with the hideous table they were sitting at if it meant he could stay like this forever. 

Buttressed by the fact that David wasn’t actually looking in Patrick’s eyes, instead watching the disgusting, gyrating crowd of teens in front of him, he found himself whispering, “I like you a lot.”

But because Patrick was Patrick, he shifted a bit and turned so he could look David straight on with those indecently sincere eyes and say, “I like you a lot, too.”

David bit down his smile. “I would kiss you right now, but kissing someone who has a bloody paper towel hanging out of their nose is incorrect.”

It was unbelievable that Patrick’s eyes sparkled at this discussion of blood, but they did. “Raincheck, then.”

“Yeah,” David said softly. 

The song changed again, and suddenly they were surrounded by a clump of dancing students. “We decided to bring the dance floor to you,” Rachel said, grabbing Patrick’s free arm and waving it around in some sort of attempt at the wave, which he enthusiastically participated in, because he was a nerd. Stevie wandered over and made some sort of horrid attempt at the shopping cart, presumably just to annoy David, and Alexis booped him on the nose as she danced past. 

“I hate this,” David announced, but if this were a teen movie (and it kind of felt like one), this was when the narrator would interject and say, no. In fact, David did not hate this one bit. 

* * *

By around midnight, they all ended up making the trek to the diner in Elmdale, because the only establishment in Schitt’s Creek still open at this time was the Wobbly Elm, and while David actually had a very compelling fake, it was a little less useful in a town where everyone knew everyone. 

They shoved all the tables together in the center of the room and crowded around their newly-created mega-table, pushing people and passing around menus with the general raucousness of a group of teenagers after a school dance. It’s not like David would really know, given his lack of experience, but it seemed right. 

David was a little nervous at first, because Stevie ended up sitting a little ways away across the table and Alexis was all the way at the end, preoccupied with Ted, and he wasn’t sure how he was going to handle such intense interfacing with Patrick’s friends without the two of them as buffers. But Twyla requested a dramatic retelling of how David and Patrick got together, and both David and Rachel took great joy in correcting Patrick’s errors in sharing the story, with Stevie giving the occasional interjection from down the table, and it was good. 

The conversation turned to something else eventually, and sometimes David participated, and sometimes he just watched, but somewhere along the way Patrick took his hand under the table, and how could David have any complaints after that? Well, actually he had one complaint, and that was that his pancakes hadn’t arrived yet, so when their waiter finally emerged with David’s ungodly high stack of pancakes, his mouth started watering immediately. Despite the fact that he refused to let go of Patrick’s hand and therefore was working with limited capacity, he still made quick work of preparing his food.

“If only you’d look at me like you look at those pancakes,” Patrick said, faux-wistfully.

“Turn into a stack of pancakes and I will,” David shot back, a syruped forkful already shoved into his mouth. 

Several people laughed. Patrick grabbed David’s face and planted a kiss to his cheek, and David felt himself blushing just as he noticed Stevie hold her phone up and take a picture. 

The whole town would surely know about them by Monday. The high school rumor mill was an unstoppable force, and David was almost positive the entire school already knew. Despite Rachel’s valiant attempts to keep things civil, there were probably Twitter feeds filled with pictures of them across the internet with captions announcing that David Rose had stooped to a new low and found himself a small-town beau. Some heartless tabloid with no respect for minors would blast the images out onto the web and it would land on the trending pages of all the people he used to know in New York, and they would definitely judge him. 

But right now, he was holding Patrick’s hand in the grungy diner in Elmdale where they had their first real date, surrounded by friends, like, _actual_ real friends, and David couldn’t find it in him to care what those people thought. 

So as he sat, laughing with his friends, hand in hand with his boyfriend _,_ chowing down on pancakes, David found himself just watching Patrick, studying him. Memorizing every line in his face, every freckle that fought its way to the surface of his cheeks even in the dead of winter. If he looked long enough, David thought, if he seared it into his brain the way he wanted to, maybe he _could_ actually finish his portrait of Patrick from memory, like he’d once claimed he could do with Mariah.

His recreation could never compare to the real thing, of course, but maybe he’d finally let Patrick see it. He deserved it. He deserved everything, and at last, David was prepared to give it to him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for tagging along for the ride, folks! I'm reymanova on Tumblr if anyone cares to come yell into the void with me.


End file.
